Skepticism

EVENTS

Why I am an atheist – Sandra Goodick

I am an atheist because I am a feminist. I think that statement is self-explanatory but others have been stumped by it so let me elaborate.

When I was young, my parents sent us (my siblings and I) to Catholic school. We weren’t a terribly devout family, but the Catholic school was very close by and, technically, we were Catholic so off we went.

Given our age, my classmates and I were on the cusp of modernization. The Church was moving towards a softer, gentler Catholicism. But, our priests were old and we still got the old lessons. So, when I was 8 yrs old and preparing for 1st Confession, Father Tim informed the girls (in a special lesson that we were seperated from the boys to receive) about the punishments of Eve. Not only were we responsible for the Fall of Man from His Perfect StateTM but we (as in “all women for all time”) would have to pay for it also. In particular, we would have to pay for it by submitting to the authority of our fathers, brothers and, someday, husbands and sons. The feminist in me revolted and in a moment of clarity where I may have actually exclaimed: “Eureka!” (It’s hard to tell since all I could hear was the blood rushing in my ears, maybe I yelled “Bullshit”) I knew that he was lying.

I told him so as well. There are few things in this world that an 8 yr old is certain of but I was certain of these things. First, I knew that I was smarter than my brother and the likelihood that I would ever submit to his will was right up there with pigs producing beef (experience has held up my childhood hypothesis). Also, I knew that sons damn well submitted to the will of their mothers, if they knew what was good for them. Plus, lots of women don’t get married and even those who do marry don’t universally submit to their spouses, so that rules out husbands. And, as for the will of our fathers… Well, every child (male or female) submitted to the will of its father, there was nothing special about girls in that case.

I was promptly sent to the hallway by my teacher to consider my insubordination for the remainder of Christian Living. This was a bad move on the teacher’s part as it gave me time to think and my moment of clarity blossomed. If Father Tim was lying about Eve, what else was he lying about (other than the fact that he was sexually assaulting altar boys regularly – a fact that didn’t come out until I was in my 20s)?

Once I asked that question and started to examine the claims of the Church, it was only a matter of time before I was a full-out atheist. Although I rejected Catholicism at first (because I didn’t know enough about other religions to accept/deny them) ultimately I realized it was the existence of god that I was rejecting. I didn’t really give religion any thought in high school (in Canada in the 1980s, religion was only discussed as a strange phenomena of a by-gone age) and it wasn’t until I took a university course in Philosophy in Religion that I seriously thought about faith and the existence of a supernatural world. That’s when I realized the interconnections between the Abrahamic faiths and how equally spurious their claims were.

So, by the time I was 20 yrs old, I had considered the question and decided that I was an atheist. But ultimately, what sent me down that road was my feminism. And I’m still a feminist now – and an atheist, trade unionist and social justice activist.

Comments

So Catholicism doesn’t mesh well with your inner feminist- so what? Why assume that your feminist ideals are right?

So some of the Catholic priests are pedophiles- what conclusions can you draw from this? That God doesn’t exist? Really?

So your observed that the women you grew up around weren’t always submitting to their husbands- and? Why assume that Eve’s punishment was a “lie” rather than just those women failing to live up to a biblical principle?

Maybe I’m being a little harsh, sure, but the one section that *could* have touched on why you’re an atheist (the part where you say you studied philosophy of religion), you (for whatever reason) chose to not expound on, so my criticism stands.

If your critical thinking in that philosophy of religion class was anything like the critical thinking involved in writing this essay, I’d bet a lot of the class you probably ignored, misunderstood (or both), or were just too busy disagreeing with on prior grounds (i.e. your feminism) that you weren’t open to learning the philosophy behind it to begin with.

This essay is a great example of the arrogance and poor reasoning skills most atheists use in coming to rejecting the existence of God. Thank you for posting this. I have saved the text and taken screenshots to prove later on (should the question arise) that this is the quality of work that gets associated with P.Z. Myers.

I took nearly the opposite route between feminism and atheism. I was Catholic as well, and then became an atheist after rejecting first Catholicism, then Christianity, then the Abrahamic religions, then religion as a whole. Reading atheist and liberal blogs led me to feminist issues, and that is what made me realize that I was also a feminist. It’s wonderful, really, how well the two go together.

Philo up there needs to learn the importance of the words “ultimately, what sent me down that road was my feminism.” Everyone has something that makes them start thinking about these things, and that’s the story that Sandra decided to share with us. That the incident led her to eventually take that philosophy class and become an atheist is just more information, but the story is about that first moment when she started to doubt, which I think many of us can relate to. There is no rule stating that every story must contain each person’s entire philosophical reasoning for being an atheist. Personal stories are just that, stories.

Good post; basically this seems to confirm that a key ingredient in escape from religious indoctrination is a bit of self-confidence and a willingness to push back against world-views from authority figures, even at a young age.

Philo: These “Why am I an Atheist” posts are not supposed to be proofs that there is no god, but peoples’ individual stories about how they reached their current outlook and attitudes with regard to these sorts of claims.

I think the parts of the original post that come closest to addressing your criticisms are:

If Father Tim was lying about Eve, what else was he lying about?

and

Although I rejected Catholicism at first (because I didn’t know enough about other religions to accept/deny them) ultimately I realized it was the existence of god that I was rejecting.

When you discover that a thing you have been told by a member of an identifiable group is not true, you begin to treat their other assertions as questionable. When you realise how many of the things they say are not confirmed by any other source except other similar liars, I think it’s pretty reasonable to reject those things outright. Having rejected a religion that nearly got its claws into her early when she was relatively intellectually vulnerable, why should Ms Goodick immediately go looking for people similar to the first set of liars who are making similar claims and carefully evaluate all of those claims?

To speak for myself: I am not here to disprove anyone’s stories. I lack a belief in your god, and similarly lack a belief in anyone else’s. If you want to spread your god idea, cool, I’m a good target (since I have no existing god-belief) but the onus is on you to provide evidence. I’m always interested to know what believers actually believe, and I like to hear the reasons as long as they aren’t just lazily parroting apologetics already worn thin by endless repetition.

But if you’re liking the Christianity it doesn’t actually mean that god does exist. If you don’t like Catholicism, you have over 2500 gods to worship to choose from. Which ist the truest, and only one?
AND ONE THING. When you look at “reasons” to believe in supernatural or being an atheist you’ll also find emotional and social factors that affected the decision. Every single decision are driven by emotional factors, and rationalised post factum. But, some have these emotional factors closely connected to reality. You can be an atheist because a priest in your school pissed you off, or you read greatest philosophers or scientists. It’s a story of becoming one. Road to atheism can be based on rational ground from scratch, or came from dissatisfaction connected with organised religions or just being bored in church. Ways and reasons are multiple.
Only rational reason, as far as i am concerned, to subscribe to a particular cult is fear of persecution. And this in my view only depends on a person.

To be clear: you demonstrated poor reasoning skills by not understanding that the intent of this particular post was not to lay out an argument against the existence of gods but to elucidate the catalyst that sent one person down the path of atheism. You are aware that “Why I am an Atheist” can be parsed in different ways aren’t you?

And you demonstrate arrogance when you expanded on your initial mis-read by extrapolating out to some presumed academic failure based one story. You are aware that a single sample is too small to make any kind of accurate judgment from aren’t you?

To get back to the OP: Thank you Ms. Goodick, I enjoyed your story. As a Canadian of the same vintage but who went to public school I had no idea that that sort of thing was going on.

True, it was a story and was surely not meant to be an exhaustive treatise on the rational justification of atheism, you’re right- but let’s look at a few excerpts and try to see where she’s coming from, shall we.

1) “I am an atheist because I am a feminist. I think that statement is self-explanatory but others have been stumped by it so let me elaborate.”

She rejects theism on feminist grounds. That’s pretty straight-forward, I think. Theism, to her, gets it wrong when it comes to feminist ideals and so there’s an implied message that because atheism doesn’t take this same position, she adopts atheism instead.

2) “So, when I was 8 yrs old…Father Tim informed the girls…about the punishments of Eve. Not only were we responsible for the Fall of Man…but we would have to pay for it also. In particular, we would have to pay for it…by submitting to the authority of our fathers, brothers and, someday, husbands and sons. The feminist in me revolted…”

She’s 8 years old when a religious leader expounds on some religious doctrines that aren’t exactly feminist at heart and she objects to them because she finds them inconsistent (as she later explains) with her observation of the world around her. Now let’s look at why she rejects them:

3) “…in a moment of clarity where I may have actually exclaimed: “Eureka!” (It’s hard to tell since all I could hear was the blood rushing in my ears, maybe I yelled “Bullshit”) I knew that he was lying.”

“I told him so as well. There are few things in this world that an 8 yr old is certain of…I knew that I was smarter than my brother…I knew that sons damn well submitted to the will of their mothers… Plus, lots of women don’t get married and even those who do marry don’t universally submit to their spouses, so that rules out husbands.”

She rejects the doctrine the priest is teaching her because something in her just knows it isn’t right. Or at least that’s how she feels. She can’t imagine submitting to a less intelligent sibling, nor does she witness womanly submission in her everyday life, and so rejects it. But do you notice how she doesn’t give a reason for thinking why her observations of the world should supercede the doctrine? She calls it a “lie”, but what about it is a lie? That it doesn’t seem to comport with her observations? Her objection ultimately comes down to a gut feeling. Fine. She’s 8 years old and this is just a brief little personal story, so we should let it slide. Surely she won’t just leave it at that. Surely she’ll touch on this later and explain why it’s lie…right?

4) “Once I asked that question and started to examine the claims of the Church, it was only a matter of time before I was a full-out atheist. Although I rejected Catholicism at first…ultimately I realized it was the existence of god that I was rejecting.”

At first she thinks she’s just rejecting the doctine she’s been taught, then later she “realizes” that she rejects the entire enterprise of religion. So her feminism *was* the catalyst for her atheism.

5) “…it wasn’t until I took a university course in Philosophy in Religion that I seriously thought about faith and the existence of a supernatural world. That’s when I realized the interconnections between the Abrahamic faiths and how equally spurious their claims were.”

She studies religion, finds it uncompelling (for reasons not listed) and then:

6) “So, by the time I was 20 yrs old, I had considered the question and decided that I was an atheist.”

Sure, this may just be a brief personal story and there may be some theological objections she doesn’t touch on because it isn’t the goal of the story, but the fact remains: she titled this “Why I’m an Atheist” and didn’t touch on the justification of her position at all. She listed a doctrine she disagrees with, assumed her gut feelinng was right on the matter, and gave the impression her atheism was nothing more than an 8-year olds rejection of religion.

Do you not think the title “Why I am an Atheist” is a nod to philosophers like Bertrand Russell, Colin McGinn, et al?

This “Why I am an Atheist” series Myers seems to have going on his site may, to you, just be a popular series atheists partake in to share their personal stories, but to people who’ve read atheist philosophers like Russell (and others), this certainly comes off like an obvious literary reference.

It’s akin to a religious website hosting a “The Atheist Delusion” series, where people share conversations they’ve had with atheists that they find absurd.

Why assume that Eve’s punishment was a “lie” rather than just those women failing to live up to a biblical principle?

The Eve hypotheosis is a failed one. We have evidence from geology, anthropology, palaeontology, genetics, microbiology, biology, and a host of other evidence-based disciplines to show that no, all of humanity is not decended from one couple ca 4,004 BCE.

Maybe I’m being a little harsh, sure, but the one section that *could* have touched on why you’re an atheist (the part where you say you studied philosophy of religion), you (for whatever reason) chose to not expound on, so my criticism stands.

So because she did not make her argument the way you think appropriate, it is invalid? This is not a church. You do not get to tell others what they have to do.

This essay is a great example of the arrogance and poor reasoning skills most atheists use in coming to rejecting the existence of God.

So if she had written exactly the same essay, but had come through it with a stronger belief in gods, would it have been acceptable? Who the fuck are you to say whether someone’s reason for accepting reality and laughing at mythology is correct?

But, if ’twere true, wouldn’t churches be a whole lot different? Would they still have to lie to get and keep adherents?

She rejects theism on feminist grounds.

Theism denies the humanity and equality of females. Simple.

. . . didn’t touch on the justification of her position at all.

Odd. I thought the essay well-written and that it did a good job of explaining how she got where she is. If you, Philo, do not understand, perhaps you should remove your biblical lenses and godglasses and actually read what what she wrote. This is not the bible. You are not supposed to impose your beliefs on her writings.

If your critical thinking in that philosophy of religion class was anything like the critical thinking involved in writing this essay, I’d bet a lot of the class you probably ignored, misunderstood (or both), or were just too busy disagreeing with on prior grounds (i.e. your feminism) that you weren’t open to learning the philosophy behind it to begin with.

That must be because of her fussy pink lady brain, huh.

I’m sure manly men would be totally “open minded” and “reasonable” studying the philosophy behind a religion that casually declares them second-class citizens. They’d be like, totally oky-doky with it.

And of course, they’d never, ever be so emotional as to be motivated one way or another on a subject by how they felt about it. No, no, no.

Perish the mere thought.

That’s like the debate about abortion rights. Why are women getting so emotional about completely intellectual and theoretical debate on their right to control their damn bodies, I just can’t fathom.

It’s akin to a religious website hosting a “The Atheist Delusion” series, where people share conversations they’ve had with atheists that they find absurd.

She rejects theism on feminist grounds. That’s pretty straight-forward, I think. Theism, to her, gets it wrong when it comes to feminist ideals and so there’s an implied message that because atheism doesn’t take this same position, she adopts atheism instead.

Since there’s two choices here, theism and atheism, if Ms. Goodick rejects theism then there’s nothing left but atheism. There’s the further point that all known brands of theism are inherently anti-feminist so if she embraces feminism then she has no choice but to embrace atheism.

It’s true there are anti-feminist atheists. But atheism itself doesn’t take a position on feminism. “Gods do not exist” is neither pro- nor anti-feminist.

She rejects the doctrine the priest is teaching her because something in her just knows it isn’t right. Or at least that’s how she feels. She can’t imagine submitting to a less intelligent sibling, nor does she witness womanly submission in her everyday life, and so rejects it. But do you notice how she doesn’t give a reason for thinking why her observations of the world should supercede the doctrine?

A theist authority tells her, based on a widely-held theist dogma, that she and all other women must submit to all men (or at least all male relatives). She realizes this dogma must be false for various reasons which she explains, i.e.: She’s not going to submit to her less intelligent brother; boys submit to their mothers; all children submit to their fathers. She informs the priest that his dogma is false and the priest and the teacher get annoyed by a child showing the falsity of their cherished dogma.

Surely she’ll touch on this later and explain why it’s lie…right?

She explained why the priest’s anti-feminist dogma was a lie. It was at odds with reality and logic. Something that doesn’t match reality is often called in common parlance a lie.

Sure, this may just be a brief personal story and there may be some theological objections she doesn’t touch on because it isn’t the goal of the story, but the fact remains: she titled this “Why I’m an Atheist” and didn’t touch on the justification of her position at all.

Philo, you need to work on your reading comprehension. Either that or argue with Sandra instead of the imaginary atheist who only exists in your head.

She rejected Catholicism because of an obviously false dogma. Later, when taking a Philosophy of Religion class, she saw that all the Abrahamic religions shared the same dogma. It’s true that she doesn’t explain why she rejects Zensunnism and animism, but I strongly suspect she found similar anti-feminist dogma in all other religions.

Most religions pretend to be pro-human. “God loves you” is a motto of most religions. So when it’s made obvious god does not love you if you have a vagina, then that’s a good reason to reject those religions which lie about god’s love.

So what’s left? Mahayana Christianity and Buddhislam only exist in fiction.

“The story of Genesis shows that it was not the original purpose of God to make any women.”

And another gooder…

“The Bible from Genesis to Revelation makes no mention of any woman ever having gone to heaven.”

Ouch, the Bible was written by douche-nozzles. And…philo, if it’s all made up out of the minds of men, then it’s all simply made up out of the minds of men. Sure, God DOES exist…in the minds of men, and no place else.

She listed a doctrine she disagrees with, assumed her gut feelinng was right on the matter, and gave the impression her atheism was nothing more than an 8-year olds rejection of religion.

That wasn’t my reading of the post. She may not have quoted the multiple other examples of misogynist sexist bullshit that trickles out of most (if not all) paternalistic, authoritarian group-delusion clubs, but we’re all aware that this one doctrine of Catholicism is not the only, or by a long chalk the worst, example.

I haven’t contributed to this series, but the reason for my atheism (that it was my default position to start with, and despite some breaks for magical wish-thinking caused by my early inability to assess certain deluded and/or dishonest peoples’ claims, I pretty much kept on gravitating back to the null hypothesis in my exploration of supernatural ideas) would be unlikely to be a major feature of my post if I did. I like the personal stories we see here, and the contributors shouldn’t feel the need to include all the obvious stuff. Fine if some do, and we’ve seen some nice statements of parts of the various arguments here too, but it’s the other stuff that’s non-obvious and keeps me reading this series.

This post was a nice, clear, tidy clarification of the relationship between feminism and rejection of ‘faith traditions’ and I felt I learned something from it. If it had been a statement of one of the many standard philosophical arguments I might have drifted off and read something else before the end – I probably would have agreed, but it would have been a less interesting read.

Misogyny triggered the OP to question her beliefs for the first time. Makes perfect sense to me. And it’s really interesting that an eight year old girl could clearly and instinctively perceive the immorality of those biblical teachings. I guess you can’t fool a smart child into hating herself, not even with the authority of the Catholic church backing you up.

Not much of an argument there. The Christian doctrine of female submission isn’t as oppressive as I think you’d like it to be. Despite what gets parroted around on forums, the teaching isn’t advocating demoting women to subhuman status.

“‘Why assume that Eve’s punishment was a “lie” rather than just those women failing to live up to a biblical principle?’The Eve hypotheosis is a failed one. We have evidence from geology, anthropology, palaeontology, genetics, microbiology, biology, and a host of other evidence-based disciplines to show that no, all of humanity is not decended from one couple ca 4,004 BCE.

Missing the point completely. A YEC interpretation of Genesis isn’t what’s being discussed here. She’s rejecting a doctrine the Catholic church was teaching her regarding the submission of women to men. That doctrine stands alone, and does not depend on a YEC interpretation of Genesis.

“‘Maybe I’m being a little harsh, sure, but the one section that *could* have touched on why you’re an atheist (the part where you say you studied philosophy of religion), you (for whatever reason) chose to not expound on, so my criticism stands.”So because she did not make her argument the way you think appropriate, it is invalid? This is not a church. You do not get to tell others what they have to do.”

I’m not telling anyone what to do. All I’m saying is that this story explains why she’s not Catholic and not why she’s an atheist. As for its validity, yes, I do think that if she gave this story as a reason for thinking God does not exist then her argument would be invalid. But as previous commenters have pointed out (and as I have previously conceded), maybe this story isn’t her reason for thinking there is no God. Maybe she has some other objections.

“‘This essay is a great example of the arrogance and poor reasoning skills most atheists use in coming to rejecting the existence of God.’So if she had written exactly the same essay, but had come through it with a stronger belief in gods, would it have been acceptable? Who the fuck are you to say whether someone’s reason for accepting reality and laughing at mythology is correct?

Now this is just outright disingenuous. I never even hinted that this thought process is only flawed because it led to atheism. The rationale is flawed (assuming that it is supposed to work as justification for a belief, which it may not) with respect to both atheism and theism. It doesn’t add to or take away from either position. This accusation is of yours is unfounded.

“‘TL;DR You not liking the Christian religion doesn’t magically mean God doesn’t exist.’But, if ’twere true, wouldn’t churches be a whole lot different? Would they still have to lie to get and keep adherents?

I don’t think churches should lie to “get and keep adherents”. You’re right.

No, it doesn’t. Religion does. Theism has no say in the matter. Your equivocation of “theism” with only Abrahamic religions is mistaken.

“‘… didn’t touch on the justification of her position at all.’Odd. I thought the essay well-written and that it did a good job of explaining how she got where she is. If you, Philo, do not understand, perhaps you should remove your biblical lenses and godglasses and actually read what what she wrote. This is not the bible. You are not supposed to impose your beliefs on her writings.

I don’t disagree that it’s well written, I disagree that it establishes a rational justification for her atheism. But again, as has been stated by myself and others, she very well may have other reasons that make her position rationally justified, and this may just be an interesting personal story. I like that you just assume I’m some theist with a Bible-based background, though. Note: every objection I’ve made could also have been made by an atheist. These are general criticisms that don’t seek to discredit atheism or establish theism- they’re criticisms of what appear to be her reasons for being an atheist.

Ah, the old “sophistimicated theology” dodge by Philo. Here’s the thing Philo, nobody needs to study theology or the philosophy of religion in order to reject religion. If one disbelieves in all deities, all theology is irrelevant, along with the associated philosophy, since it requires the twin fallacies of an imaginary deity, and a holy book not being a work of mythology/fiction. There is no evidence for deities. That is one of many reasons, including the one propounded by SG, that is sufficient for rejecting deities. All reasons a person consider sufficient will do. You might not approve, but why should we care what you think?

Not much of an argument there. The Christian doctrine of female submission isn’t as oppressive as I think you’d like it to be. Despite what gets parroted around on forums, the teaching isn’t advocating demoting women to subhuman status.

Yes it is. Why did you say something so silly ?

You are aware of the RCC’s position on birth control and abortion, so ignorance is no defence. You are simply being dishonest.

I wish I’d been that smart of an 8 year old. It took me years after that age to reject catholicism, but I just moved on to wishy-washy spiritualism, then wicca, before growing up enough to drop it all. Embracing the atheist label was something I did only after reading Pharyngula for a while.
As an 8 year old, feminism wasn’t something I knew anything about as a philosophy. It just seemed self evident from the examples of my mother and sisters: working, going to school, being independent. Learning that others weren’t as lucky was kind of a shock. I can see how with feminism and atheism one could lead to the other.
Thank you Sandra for sharing your story.

Or of you want an example outside of Catholocism, how about the failure still of the Church of England to allow woman to become bishops and the demands of a significant and vocal element within the CofE to be excused have to be “subjected” to female bishops if and when they are permitted.

Or how about the time or took, and the furore over allowing women to become priests in the first place ?

According to the post, she was told by Father Tim that as a result of the Fall of Man, women would submit to men for all time. She pointed out that this was not, in fact, what happened. Therefore, what Father Tim said was not true.

Philo, is there something about this that you don’t understand?

I like that you just assume I’m some theist with a Bible-based background, though.

If you’re not a theist with a Bible-based background, then what is your excuse for your complete failure to understand or produce logical arguments?

I sure hope this is not how they taught you to “argue” at whatever second-rate school you went to.

She’s rejecting a doctrine the Catholic church was teaching her regarding the submission of women to men. That doctrine stands alone, and does not depend on a YEC interpretation of Genesis. – philo

The justification given in the Bible is, precisely, the Genesis story. What else does this vile doctrine stand on, other than the self-interest of the overwhelmingly male hierarchies of all the main Christian and Jewish denominations?

Theism denies the humanity and equality of females. Simple.

No, it doesn’t. Religion does. Theism has no say in the matter. Your equivocation of “theism” with only Abrahamic religions is mistaken.

If religion does, then clearly theism does, as theism is a subset of religion. For one so far up their own fundament as you about your own rationality, this is a remarkably elementary point to miss.

So Catholicism doesn’t mesh well with your inner feminist- so what? Why assume that your feminist ideals are right?

Because she has the temerity to believe she’s a full human being. Obviously you disagree with that, and you also believe “Eve’s punishment” is a valid concept, meaning you don’t believe women are fully human; i.e., you’re a misogynist shitstain.

If your critical thinking in that philosophy of religion class was anything like the critical thinking involved in writing this essay, I’d bet a lot of the class you probably ignored, misunderstood (or both), or were just too busy disagreeing with on prior grounds (i.e. your feminism) that you weren’t open to learning the philosophy behind it to begin with.

And a patronizing mansplainer, to boot.

This “Why I am an Atheist” series Myers seems to have going on his site may, to you, just be a popular series atheists partake in to share their personal stories, but to people who’ve read atheist philosophers like Russell (and others), this certainly comes off like an obvious literary reference.

I must have missed the memo that any literary allusion must be backed up with content on an academic par with the literature being alluded to.

But do you notice how she doesn’t give a reason for thinking why her observations of the world should supercede the doctrine?

To echo Kemist at #14, I rather doubt you’d have expected a man to give such a reason. His observations of the world, you’d take without a grain of salt. The observations of a silly liddle gurly-brain? Nuh-uh-uh, missy! Why don’t you leave the observin’ to the menz. You’re just too emotional for that job.

The Christian doctrine of female submission isn’t as oppressive as I think you’d like it to be. Despite what gets parroted around on forums, the teaching isn’t advocating demoting women to subhuman status.

Any teaching that differentiates between the “ordained roles” of men and women, and which sets up the former to have more authority than the latter, demotes women to a de facto subhuman status. You can pretend otherwise all you like. I could bombard you with hyperlinks showing you why you’re wrong, except that the spam filter wouldn’t let me and, honestly, you’re not worth the effort.

“Ah, the old “sophistimicated theology” dodge by Philo. Here’s the thing Philo, nobody needs to study theology or the philosophy of religion in order to reject religion. If one disbelieves in all deities, all theology is irrelevant, along with the associated philosophy, since it requires the twin fallacies of an imaginary deity, and a holy book not being a work of mythology/fiction.”

I’m not saying one needs to study theology or philosophy to disbelieve. If anything, I’m saying one needs to study theology (or at least some sort of philosophy) in order to have objections that rationally justify their disbelief. Not believing due to lack of interest on the matter is much different than not believing because of good reasons, and I feel like you’re trying to blur the lines here.

“There is no evidence for deities. That is one of many reasons, including the one propounded by SG, that is sufficient for rejecting deities. All reasons a person consider sufficient will do. You might not approve, but why should we care what you think?”

This is a popular line that gets thrown around a lot but I think if you really take a minute to consider what this means it seems trivially untrue. While I disagree with this claim, let’s, for the sake of argument, assume you’re right: there’s absolutely no evidence for the existence of God. Well now given this, then, how do we explain god belief? Keep in mind, we’re assuming there is no evidence whatever for the the existence of God. We therefore cannot refer to things like Freudian desire, fear, unscientific reasoning involving appeals to the supernatural, etc as these could all be considered (albeit poor) “evidence”.

I think a better way to put this is that there’s no evidence that, upon examination, compels one to god belief, but surely that’s different than there being no evidence. Anyway, this is beside the point. This discussion isn’t about the evidence for theism, it’s about Sandra’s story of how she came to be an atheist.

@eigenperson I would like to point out in fairness, that it might not be the school’s fault that philo is incapable of producing coherent arguments with a solid basis. No matter how good the school or how much they try, there are some who refuse to learn.

philo people believe in aliens, the loch ness monster and various other absurdities that have no good evidence for them either. Just because people believe in things does not make them likely to be true.

And yes. This is Sandra’s story, which you are failing to understand, or deliberately attempting to misrepresent. So which is it?

I’m saying one needs to study theology (or at least some sort of philosophy) in order to have objections that rationally justify their disbelief.

Nope, bullshit all the way through, and you know that if you thought about it for five seconds. For example, I have all the rational justification needed with the lack of evidence for deities. NO god, no religion, period, end of story. You appear to be very dense. Try again, and make some real sense by losing a ton of presuppositions.

Not much of an argument there. The Christian doctrine of female submission isn’t as oppressive as I think you’d like it to be. Despite what gets parroted around on forums, the teaching isn’t advocating demoting women to subhuman status.

Nothing at all demeaning about commanding that wives submit to their husbands.

I’m not saying one needs to study theology or philosophy to disbelieve. If anything, I’m saying one needs to study theology (or at least some sort of philosophy) in order to have objections that rationally justify their disbelief. Not believing due to lack of interest on the matter is much different than not believing because of good reasons, and I feel like you’re trying to blur the lines here.

Only to the extent of understanding the scientific method and the null hypothesis.

Given there is no evidence for a god there is no reason for believing one exists.

The scientific method is not theology. It is philosophy, but I most people will have not studied it via philosophy classed, but in science classes.

Keep in mind, we’re assuming there is no evidence whatever for the the existence of God. We therefore cannot refer to things like Freudian desire, fear, unscientific reasoning involving appeals to the supernatural, etc as these could all be considered (albeit poor) “evidence”.

Leaving aside Freud, whose work is not precisely scientific, all human beings experience some kind of desire and some kind of fear. These emotions help keep us alive and help us reproduce. We can perceive that other people experience those states because of how they’re driven to act, and sometimes due to physiological changes like increased heartbeat or perspiration. This doesn’t mean that anything perceived in such an emotional state is necessarily existent or valid.

This is a popular line that gets thrown around a lot but I think if you really take a minute to consider what this means it seems trivially untrue. While I disagree with this claim, let’s, for the sake of argument, assume you’re right: there’s absolutely no evidence for the existence of God. Well now given this, then, how do we explain god belief? Keep in mind, we’re assuming there is no evidence whatever for the the existence of God. We therefore cannot refer to things like Freudian desire, fear, unscientific reasoning involving appeals to the supernatural, etc as these could all be considered (albeit poor) “evidence”.

Forget for the sake of argument. There is no evidence for the existence of god.

Oh, and Philo, evidence for your imaginary deity must be solid, conclusive, and physical. Evidence that will pass muster with scientists, magicians, and professional debunkers, as being of divine, and not natural (scientifically explained), origin. Philosophical mental wankings need not apply. Something equivalent to the eternally burning bush.

“Nope, bullshit all the way through, and you know that if you thought about it for five seconds. For example, I have all the rational justification needed with the lack of evidence for deities. NO god, no religion, period, end of story.

I have thought about this for five seconds. Actually, I’ve thought about this for a little longer than five seconds. I’ve been thinking about this for going on about five years now. In fact, that’s partly why, unlike your assertion, I know better than to think an absence of evidence is evidence of absence. A claim like that may fly on YouTube but it doesn’t work in the real world. Also, given the tone of your objection, it’s unlikely you’ve given the evidence an honest consideration. Or at least that’s how it appears.

“Well now given this, then, how do we explain god belief?”
Ever hear of indoctrination. Boy, are one non-thinker.

Perhaps I should have clarified on my use of “evidence”. I’m using evidence in the following manner:

On this basis, indoctrination qualifies as “evidence” because its epistemic foundation is grounded on it. And before you go running off thinking I’ve said indoctrination qualifies as evidence, note the following distinction: this kind of “evidence” means something much different than the kind of evidence used to prove or disprove something.

By “evidence”, I don’t mean this is somehow similar to evidence that would be used in court. It’s a much more general definition.

Where can I get a certificate that proves to philo that I put in enough time stdying philosophy and theology to justify my disbelieve in any diety?

You don’t need one. He does.

That the gods exist is a positive truth claim. It is up to him to prove it, not up to anyone to disprove it.

He can’t do it. That the gods exist is unfalsifiable. It is also unprovable. No on has ever been able to prove it.

What we can say is that any falsifiable truth claims made by religionists have been falsified. The earth isn’t 6,000 years old, isn’t flat, orbits the sun, and Noah didn’t have a boatload full of dinosaurs.

“Leaving aside Freud, whose work is not precisely scientific, all human beings experience some kind of desire and some kind of fear. These emotions help keep us alive and help us reproduce. We can perceive that other people experience those states because of how they’re driven to act, and sometimes due to physiological changes like increased heartbeat or perspiration. This doesn’t mean that anything perceived in such an emotional state is necessarily existent or valid.”

Agreed. I’ve clarified my use of “evidence” in my response to Nerd of Redhead, Dances OM Trolls #37. I’m using “evidence” in a much more general sense. Because talk about differing uses/meanings may lead into an awfully long discussion, I’ll simply refer you to a link and you can give it a read should you want to look into it a little more: http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/evidence/

In fact, that’s partly why, unlike your assertion, I know better than to think an absence of evidence is evidence of absence.

That is all very good, but for one problem. It is wrong.

Absence of evidence is evidence of absence. If, after many attempts to show something exists you have not succeeded in coming up with any evidence that it does, then it is quite reasonable to conclude that the reason is because it does not exist.

This is how science works at lot of the time. Why do you now know this ?

Not much of an argument there. The Christian doctrine of female submission isn’t as oppressive as I think you’d like it to be. Despite what gets parroted around on forums, the teaching isn’t advocating demoting women to subhuman status.

I see you haven’t read the horrible thing yourself.

Or else, we don’t have the same definition of “oppressive”.

I consider a command to let fathers, husbands and fucking brothers (my brother is ten years younger to me, and I remember changing hi fucking diapers) decide what’s best for me plenty oppressive, cupcake. Ditto for being considered on the same line as fucking cattle.

I defined evidence in #42, and I’m not budging one nanometer. Mental wanking conclusions aren’t evidence, but OPINION, that may or may not have a basis in reality. You obviously have trouble with reality, and appear to live in a delusional world where word games, not evidence, rule.

I love your post, Sandra. My catalyst moment is similar. I was raised Mormon. I attended public school, and one day at school my teacher told us that Mormons had practiced polygamy, with one man marrying more than one woman (but not, of course, the other way around). To my nine-year-old self, this practice was self-evidently sexist–and, I thought, not true. I had never heard of this happening in Mormonism, and (raised in not-Utah) I was acutely aware that my religion was strange to others and expected people to tell me bad things about it that were not true. I told the teacher she was wrong. I don’t remember what she said back to me, probably because I was self-righteously sure that she was making this up.

When I went home and told my mom about the lies my teacher was telling about Mormons, my mom had to tell me they weren’t lies. Some Mormons believed polygamy would be practiced again in the Celestial Kingdom.

Since my parents expected me to be Mormon and go to church every week, I experienced many more years of sexist thinking in the Mormon church. I’m sorry I have to explain this, but as a woman these things were obviously not true to me: I recognized that I was smart, ambitious, and not especially nurturing (though some women are, the idea that all women are nurturing was clearly ridiculous). I could think of no good reason why there should be any different expectations or opportunities for me than for a man.

After rejecting the religion I grew up with, it was a _lot_ easier to reject all the others! I can’t say that I studied every existing religion before I rejected it–I don’t think that is necessary. At that point, it became obvious that religion was a social construct passed down from parents to their children; binding people together in a way that they would feel connected to people in their own religion and superior to others who didn’t share their religion.

With thousands of religions to choose from, none was more obviously correct than any others. I could not conceive that there was a God who would expect you to pick the right one (or for some religions, be punished for all eternity if you picked wrong). It was clear to me that believers, not atheists, had the extraordinary claims that required proof: first, that God even existed and second, that God wanted you to do things this way, and not that way.

I defined evidence in #42, and I’m not budging one nanometer. Mental wanking conclusions aren’t evidence, but OPINION, that may or may not have a basis in reality. You obviously have trouble with reality, and appear to live in a delusional world where word games, not evidence, rule.

Well we can but hope he decides to test his concept of evidence by testing the theory of gravity whilst atop a tall building. After there is no evidence humans cannot grow wings instantaneously is there ? I mean, I know we have never seen such a thing happen, and all we know about human biology tells us it will not happen, but there no actual evidence that shows we cannot is there ? Therefore it seems quite reasonable to conclude humans are capable of growing wings!

I loved Sandra’s essay; I thought it was really interesting and well-written.

I’m not sure what Phido is doing in this thread. It’s like he’s fiercely and passionately arguing to prove how utterly stupid he is. And if he’s just trying to fuck with Teh Horde for the hell of it, then the fool is in for a lambasting. (Phido, here’s the link for the definition of “lambaste”: http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/lambaste)

The Christian doctrine of female submission isn’t as oppressive as I think you’d like it to be.

“Isn’t as oppressive”… So, it’s just a a little oppressive; therefore, we little laydeez shouldn’t complain about it? It’s really not so bad after all…?

Funny how Cat-O-Lick apologists always go the mental masturbation route, rather than the hard evidence route. Almost like they know they have lost the argument, but with some smoke, mirrors, and fast talking they might be able to deflect you from noticing the obvious. Not at this blog, where we see this bullshit on a regular basis. Philo is in deep doo doo, and we know it.

The Christian doctrine of female submission isn’t as oppressive as I think you’d like it to be.

I don’t want any oppression at all. Any oppression of my fellow humans based on race, sex, disability, ethnicity, religion, lack of religion, anything, is unacceptable.

Claiming that traditional Christianity is not misogynistic means to me that you have not actually read the bible. Or listened to most of the modern Christian sects and their take on abortion, divorce, rape, spousal rape, child marriage, etc. (different sects have different views on these subjects which concern women’s rights, but, save for a few sects, the position taken is usually one that discriminates against women).

“Absence of evidence is evidence of absence. If, after many attempts to show something exists you have not succeeded in coming up with any evidence that it does, then it is quite reasonable to conclude that the reason is because it does not exist.”

I understand the appeal of being able to write off the existence of something which has no evidence but I think there are good reasons for believing that this method is mistaken. I’ll list the reasons as briefly as I can and then sketch out an example, and hopefully it’ll elucidate my point.

“Absence of evidence is not evidence of absence” doesn’t work because:

Reason 1) Using this line of thought can lead us to deny the existence of things that aren’t yet known but could one day be discovered.

Example: The existence of intelligent extra-terrestrial life. As it stands, we have no evidence that justifies believing intelligent extra-terrestrial life exists elsewhere in the universe (some may argue we have good reasons for thinking so, which I would tend to agree with, so probably this should be reworded to mean we have no physical evidence at least). All of the evidence for life in the universe that we do have has come from our own planet. If we employ this line of reasoning (“an absence of evidence is evidence of absence”) then the apparent non sequitur “Therefore, there are no other intelligent life forms elsewhere in the universe.” follows. But surely this doesn’t seem right. Our having no evidence for intelligent extra-terrestrial life doesn’t necessarily mean there is no life to be found. A possible explanation for this absence of evidence could be that we just haven’t found it yet.

Reason 2) Using this line of thought irrationally negates the truth of a proposition.

Example: Suppose Casey murders Caylee. Furthermore, suppose Casey murders Caylee in such a way that during the investigation no incriminating evidence is found to tie her to Caylee’s murder. Given that the proposition,

P1: Caylee was murdered by Casey.

is true if Casey really did murder her, and is not true if she did not, consider what happens when we employ this line of reasoning to the situation:

There is no evidence that Casey murdered Caylee.
Therefore, ~P1 (or, “Casey did not murder Caylee.”)

It doesn’t hold up. Sure, the lack of evidence may be enough to get Casey a “not guilty” verdict, but this is much different than making the negation of the proposition,

P1: Caylee was murdered by Casey.

true. It is still true that Caylee was murdered by Casey. The truth of the proposition does not change (or does not become negated, rather) simply because an investigation yields nothing.

We therefore cannot refer to things like Freudian desire, fear, unscientific reasoning involving appeals to the supernatural, etc as these could all be considered (albeit poor) “evidence”. – philo

Not by anyone with any sense. However, if you insist on redfining evidence in this way, what do you think you have gained? The statement that there is “no evidence” can simply be modified to “no evidence worth taking seriously”. If you, or anyone else, had any such evidence for the existence of any god, it would presumably have been presented for examination by now. What do we get instead? Stories of personal experience, unverifiable by others an d often mututally contradictory; accounts of alleged miracles that never stand up to examination; “sacred” literature that claims to be authored or inspired by a god, but shows every sign of human composition; the “fine tuning” argument, which only proves that since we exist, the universe has to be such that we can live in it; and a variety of logical sleights-of-hand such as the ontological and cosmological arguments. Pfft. Theists have had thousands of years to come up with something better, and have an unrelieved record of complete and ignominious failure. If you dispute this, present what you consider to be the strongest evidence.

I have thought about this for five seconds. Actually, I’ve thought about this for a little longer than five seconds. I’ve been thinking about this for going on about five years now.

Very likely, and rather sad.

In fact, that’s partly why, unlike your assertion, I know better than to think an absence of evidence is evidence of absence.

That depends on what it’s absence of evidence for. Admittedly, if we posit a god that is determined to remain undetected, then absence of evidence is not evidence of absence – but as in the case of fairies, banshees, werewolves and similar denizens of the supernatural realms, we are none the less justified in not believing in such a being, although not in saying – as very few atheists do – that we can have absolute certainty in the matter. But if we consider, for example, the Christian god, this fellow is supposed to be omnipotent, benevolent, and keen both to be believed in, and to have a close, loving, personal relationship with each of us. Absence of evidence in this case most certainly is quite overwhelming evidence of absence. As it turns out, Kurt Vonnegut had to invent the Church of God Utterly Indifferent, because no real religions posit such a deity.

There is no evidence that Casey murdered Caylee.
Therefore, ~P1 (or, “Casey did not murder Caylee.”)

It doesn’t hold up. Sure, the lack of evidence may be enough to get Casey a “not guilty” verdict, but this is much different than making the negation of the proposition,

But it does make it wrong of you to act as if it were true.

Science is different from the courtroom, but in essence, acting as if something exists when you have not evidence thereof is plain stupid, just as if acting as if you know someone is a murderer when you have no evidence is wrong.

So until and unless you bring evidence for you particular flavor of god, the most rational course of action for me is to act as if it doesn’t exist, i.e., de facto atheism.

If you bring me evidence that the horrible monster actually exists, then my most rational and noble course of action becomes making it the purpose of my life to destroy it since it offends my innate sense of justice.

Incidentally, philo, I consider that the absence of evidence for intelligent extraterrestrial life is evidence – strong though not conclusive – that there is no such life in the local group of galaxies at least, or at any rate, none that has been around for very long on cosmic timescales and still exists*. As Fermi put it:

Where is everybody?

With regard to non-intelligent extraterrestrial life, on the other hand, absence of evidence is not (yet) evidence of absence, because we have not yet undertaken the research that would be necessary to find it, even if it is very common.

*I expect disagreement from many fellow-atheists on this point, but I consider that this is based on wishful thinking.

With regard to non-intelligent extraterrestrial life, on the other hand, absence of evidence is not (yet) evidence of absence, because we have not yet undertaken the research that would be necessary to find it, even if it is very common.

We do, however, at least have a clue as to what we can look for — reducing atmosphere, for instance, would be a dead giveaway that a certain form of life existed on that planet.

For gods, however, other than evidence of actual intersection with the measurable world (which we have looked for and have conspicuously failed to find), there is nothing for which we can look.

I’ve never needed any other reason for rejecting god than the “clear and obvious bullshit” one.

Theories are supported by facts, and every fact must fit in with a web of other facts. Religion wants to be its own damned spider. Trying to reconcile it with science only leads to increasingly absurd excuses, or complete abominations of thought like creationism.

A super-powerful celestial lord should be shaping the cosmos like gravity shapes light. But there’s no evidence of any shape, shadow, influence, fingerprint, you name it. Not a skerrick. What’s the chance that scientists, with no preconception of god, would derive from their findings so much as a tentative hypothesize that a divine being might be necessary for how the cosmos is? Almost certainly none.

and I’m late to this and incoherent from lack of sleep, so here’s rambling.

The whole premise “Women must submit” is obviously crap. Even if it were practiced perfectly, it’d still be crap. When I was a little kid in fundie school, I *saw* many examples of a man trying to deal with some problem while ignoring or dismissing help because that help was offered by women. The woman was supposed to sit silently by until the man directed her in what to do, even if the man didn’t know what he was doing and the woman did – the woman was supposed to immediately stop working on whatever it was and become an adjunct of a less experienced man. We had potlucks in our sect, and invariably afterward, the men retired to sit around and chat while the women did all the clean-up. Obviously the dishes would get done faster if everyone helped, and then *everyone* could rest on this supposed day of rest? Obviously, it would be fair and charitable to at least take turns, or for the men to do the washing since the women already did all the cooking? But I don’t see anything holy, worthy or loving about a doctrine of unfairness. It makes a whole class of behaviors okay when boys do them and sinful when girls do the exact same things, even when those are beneficial, loving things like helping and teaching, or even just talking. Women are just supposed to be inherently sinful no matter how much good they do, and that’s bullshit even *within* a doctrine supposedly about love and forgiveness.

p.s.: And God fucked up. If women (via Eve) are responsible for sin existing in the world, then God should’ve sent Jesus to be born as a woman, die horribly and painfully in childbirth, and by that act remove the onus of Original Sin and the suffering of childbirth from all women forever. So if it weren’t for misogyny, we’d’ve been living in a better world already. >_>

And God fucked up. If women (via Eve) are responsible for sin existing in the world, then God should’ve sent Jesus to be born as a woman, die horribly and painfully in childbirth, and by that act remove the onus of Original Sin and the suffering of childbirth from all women forever.

[humour]Gods tried that. About 400 times. And no matter how good her message was, Julia Christa was told to shut up and be a good woman — cook, clean up, get pregnant, serve silently. Four hundred or so times — dying in child birth each and every time. That’s when gods gave up and incarnated as a man. And people listened. Still got it all wrong, but they at least listened, right?[/humour]

And God fucked up. If women (via Eve) are responsible for sin existing in the world, then God should’ve sent Jesus to be born as a woman, die horribly and painfully in childbirth, and by that act remove the onus of Original Sin and the suffering of childbirth from all women forever. So if it weren’t for misogyny, we’d’ve been living in a better world already. >_>

Enceladus is easier: water is thought to be spraying out of the cracks in the icy surface layer from a subsurface ocean, so a probe can fly through the plume and look for (presumably ex-) lifeforms. My hunch is that there would prove to be none, but it’s certainly worth a shot.

I understand the appeal of being able to write off the existence of something which has no evidence but I think there are good reasons for believing that this method is mistaken. I’ll list the reasons as briefly as I can and then sketch out an example, and hopefully it’ll elucidate my point.

Good, have a go then. I hope it will elucidate your point and not just waste my time.

Reason 1) Using this line of thought can lead us to deny the existence of things that aren’t yet known but could one day be discovered.

Oh dear. We are not off to a good start. All knowledge is provisional. Indeed, a central tenet of the scientific method is that just that.

Reason 2) Using this line of thought irrationally negates the truth of a proposition.

]

This is just gibberish.

Well that was easy. Why did you think you could get away with this. Are you stupid ? Do you think we are stupid ?

You have lied three times now, if not more. Once would be enough to label you a lying scumbag. What do you think lying three times should get you labelled as ?

And we are still waiting for your evidence (proper evidence that is) for the existence of god. You claimed you had some, and we asked you to provide it. Your silence suggests you have none, so that would lie #4.

#67 – this example calls for some Bayesian statistics. Stand back, this could get messy.

Hypothesis H1: God exists
Hypothesis H2: God does not exist

Evidence E: we observe a lack of evidence for God

Bayes (and Laplace) tell us: p(H|E) = p(E|H) p(H) / p(E)

p(E|H) means “the probability of observing evidence E given that hypothesis H is true”
p(H) is our initial guess that hypothesis H is true
p(E) is the probability of observing evidence E no matter which hypothesis is true
p(H|E) is our new estimate that hypothesis H is true after taking account of evidence E

Now before we start we have to provide our initial guesses about the probabilities that H1 or H2 are true, so let’s say initially we’re undecided: p(H1) = 0.5 and p(H2) = 0.5. Now let’s try to update our beliefs based on evidence E:

The first value, p(E|H1), is unknown, i.e. we don't know the probability of having no evidence for God given that God exists. If this probability is low we are saying that if God exists, then we really should see evidence for it. If it's high, then we're saying that, as far as we know, even if a God exists there is a good chance that we still won't be able to discover any evidence.

So when someone says "absence of evidence is (not) evidence of absence" they are really telling you what they think about the value of p(E|H1).

Incidentally, philo, I consider that the absence of evidence for intelligent extraterrestrial life is evidence – strong though not conclusive – that there is no such life in the local group of galaxies at least, or at any rate, none that has been around for very long on cosmic timescales and still exists

Exactly. I don’t think anyone would consider conclusions drawn from the lack of evidence are as strong as conclusions that can be drawn when there is evidence, but it is still evidence. Where it not, then we would have to say that the question of whether there is life in the local group is unresolved, when in fact whilst we have no certainty (something unobtainable outside of maths anyway) we can say with some confidence there is no life.

The first value, p(E|H1), is unknown, i.e. we don’t know the probability of having no evidence for God given that God exists. If this probability is low we are saying that if God exists, then we really should see evidence for it. If it’s high, then we’re saying that, as far as we know, even if a God exists there is a good chance that we still won’t be able to discover any evidence.

I get your general point, but when it comes to the existence of god, at least the god typically worshipped, then by definition there is evidence and that evidence can be found. Therefore when no such evidence is found, it becomes evidence that god does not exist.

I have previously addressed the problems of there being no evidence when god does not interact with the Universe, but then it is not clear such an entity can truly be considered a god anyway.

Reason 1) Using this line of thought can lead us to deny the existence of things that aren’t yet known but could one day be discovered.

But until evidence is found (such as animals that feed on sulfer compounds around ocean floor vents, such as the finely bedded strata with no bioturbation or trace fossils right at the Permian/Triassic boundary, such as the rings of Saturn) for an idea or an object, the absence of evidence can be taken as evidence of absence. Once evidence is found, you have evidence of presence and can then proceed to the next steps.

if you’ve searched like hell everywhere it possibly could be, then it almost certainly isn’t there.

Assuming your magnetometer isn’t faulty of course.

Also assuming you haven’t been testing walkie-talkies that operate on the same frequency as your oven in which you are baking the PT boundary cores to remove overprint.

Also assuming you haven’t been testing walkie-talkies that operate on the same frequency as your oven in which you are baking the PT boundary cores to remove overprint.

I know you are kidding here, but scientists of course do give consideration as to why they did not find evidence when looking for it. It is not as though they get a negative result and give up. The look to see if the experiment was flawed, or that there maybe some something they thought they understood but don’t.

I know you are kidding here, but scientists of course do give consideration as to why they did not find evidence when looking for it. It is not as though they get a negative result and give up. The look to see if the experiment was flawed, or that there maybe some something they thought they understood but don’t.

Oh, I know. Not finding evidence when it should be there must be odd. This wasn’t so much a flawed experiment as it was a case of Murphy’s damn law showing up.

This particular case involved Peter Ward and Joe Kirschvink (at CalTech). They were removing the overprint from some cores taken in the Lootsburg area of South Africa and yes, the episode with the walkie-talkies did happen. Reduced the cores to molten rock at 1200C. They were able to get new cores thanks to an NSF grant and confirmed that the land extinction and the ocean extinction happened at the same geologic moment thanks to the reversals.

All I’m saying is that this story explains why she’s not Catholic and not why she’s an atheist.

Sandra made this very clear at the OP:

Once I … started to examine the claims of the Church, it was only a matter of time before I was a full-out atheist. Although I rejected Catholicism at first (because I didn’t know enough about other religions to accept/deny them) ultimately I realized it was the existence of god that I was rejecting. [emphasis mine]

============

pamoyas @ #60

…it became obvious that religion was a social construct passed down from parents to their children; binding people together in a way that they would feel connected to people in their own religion and superior to others who didn’t share their religion.

God fucked up. If women (via Eve) are responsible for sin existing in the world, then God should’ve sent Jesus to be born as a woman, die horribly and painfully in childbirth, and by that act remove the onus of Original Sin and the suffering of childbirth from all women forever. So if it weren’t for misogyny, we’d’ve been living in a better world already.

Reason 1) Using this line of thought can lead us to deny the existence of things that aren’t yet known but could one day be discovered.

Matt Penfold:

Oh dear. We are not off to a good start. All knowledge is provisional. Indeed, a central tenet of the scientific method is that just that.

This is exactly right.

All scientific knowledge is provisional We don’t prove things. We try to to falsify them.

Facts and theories that have withstood a century or two of falsification are considered asymptopically close to the truth. As the National Academy is Science says about The Theory of Evolution, “After 150 years of continuous challenges it is unlikely to ever by falsified.”

Philo is dumb, this is basic stuff taught in freshman college.

BTW, Philo, you don’t have to worry about us not finding out new things. Many of us are scientists. It’s our damn job to find out new and interesting things.

Cthulhu, messed up the formatting. You can tell how important Philo’s logical fallacies are.

Philo the idiot:

Reason 1) Using this line of thought can lead us to deny the existence of things that aren’t yet known but could one day be discovered.

Matt Penfold:

Oh dear. We are not off to a good start. All knowledge is provisional. Indeed, a central tenet of the scientific method is that just that.

This is exactly right.

All scientific knowledge is provisional. We don’t prove things. We try to to falsify them.

Facts and theories that have withstood a century or two of falsification are considered asymptopically close to the truth. As the National Academy is Science says about The Theory of Evolution, “After 150 years of continuous challenges it is unlikely to ever by falsified.”

Philo is dumb, this is basic stuff taught in freshman college.

BTW, Philo, you don’t have to worry about us not finding out new things. Many of us are scientists. It’s our damn job to find out new and interesting things.

I’m reminded of something that Kurt Vonnegut wrote. He once posed the question: why do Christians find it so easy to be cruel? He blamed what he called “the slipshod storytelling in the New Testament.”
Essentially, he posited that many who read the story of Jesus’ crucifixion come away with the wrong lesson, thinking “whoa, they lynched the wrong guy that time.” It follows naturally from this that there are right people to lynch, people who aren’t so well-connected as Jesus, Son of God, was.
Vonnegut thought the story would have provided a better lesson had Jesus been some worthless bum his whole life, and God had only decided to adopt him once they nailed him to the cross. This would teach people that even the lowliest on earth have value in God’s eyes.

“But until evidence is found (such as animals that feed on sulfer compounds around ocean floor vents, such as the finely bedded strata with no bioturbation or trace fossils right at the Permian/Triassic boundary, such as the rings of Saturn) for an idea or an object, the absence of evidence can be taken as evidence of absence. Once evidence is found, you have evidence of presence and can then proceed to the next steps.”

AND

“Philo, absence of evidence is evidence of absence. It’s just not proof of absence. However, given enough lack of evidence, the truth that the non-evident does not exist becomes highly probable.”

Again, this comes down to how we’re using “evidence”. If you use the word to mean “that which tends to prove or disprove something”, then obviously your examples don’t work- not finding animals that feed on sulfur compounds around ocean floor vents, for example, does not make the proposition,

“P1: There are no animals that feed on sulfur compounds around ocean floor vents.”

true until new evidence is uncovered. In the state of an absence of evidence you do not, by default, reason negatively (or positively for that matter). Unless the referent is a logically incoherent concept, neutrality is always the default, not negation.

As I mentioned earlier, the default position regarding intelligent extra-terrestrial life is not negation- a lack of evidence for intelligent life does not justify the conclusion that there is no life elsewhere in the universe.

“The whole premise “Women must submit” is obviously crap. Even if it were practiced perfectly, it’d still be crap. When I was a little kid in fundie school, I *saw* many examples of a man trying to deal with some problem while ignoring or dismissing help because that help was offered by women. The woman was supposed to sit silently by until the man directed her in what to do, even if the man didn’t know what he was doing and the woman did – the woman was supposed to immediately stop working on whatever it was and become an adjunct of a less experienced man.”

I felt compelled to respond to this because, while I admittedly haven’t studied all that much Christian doctrine, I at least know that this is not an example of biblical submission. Your disdain for this type of subjection is understandable and I agree with you when you say,

“I don’t see anything holy, worthy or loving about a doctrine of unfairness.”

As I said earlier, the biblical mandates for womanly submission are not as oppressive as they’re made out to be. There is a jarring popular understanding prevalent today (in Christianity, for example) of what this “submission” is and I think it’s largely due to the acceptance of doctrines with little or no scriptural support. I think, when all of the relevant passages are read together, the New Testament concept of womanly submission is much different than it’s made out to be. It is not gender enslavement.

‘Reason 1) Using this line of thought can lead us to deny the existence of things that aren’t yet known but could one day be discovered.’
“Oh dear. We are not off to a good start. All knowledge is provisional. Indeed, a central tenet of the scientific method is that just that.”

All knowledge is not provisional. That is philosophical dogma often parroted but it’s demonstrably false.

‘Reason 2) Using this line of thought irrationally negates the truth of a proposition.’
“This is just gibberish.”

It’s not gibberish. This is a fundamental concept in logic. If you don’t understand it or would like clarification, you can just say that. There’s no need to take pride in your rude ignorance. I’m not pretending to know anything other than what I’ve studied and if you don’t happen to study logic or philosophy or math, that’s fine. Just say that. But don’t try to pass off your pompous disregard as a meaningful counter- those who don’t know better will be deceived and those who do will think you’re a fool.

To clarify: irrational belief of the negation a proposition is the result of applying the dictum, “Absence of evidence is evidence of absence.” What this means is that for any proposition, P, the negation of P (that is, ~P) does not necessarily follow simply due to a lacking amount of evidence available. This is not controversial. All logicians, philosophers, etc will agree with this. Consider atheist philosopher Kai Nielsen’s remarks,

“To show that an argument is invalid or unsound is not to show that the conclusion of the argument is false…All the proofs of God’s existence may fail, but it still may be the case that God exists.” source: Kai Nielsen, Reason and Practice, (New York: Harper and Row, 1971) pp. 143–44.

“p(E|H2) = 1.0 <== obviously if there's no God there cannot be evidence, so the probability is 1.0"

This seems wrong. If there is no God, there could be evidence or good reasons for knowing this to be so. Consider if the concept of God was a logically incoherent idea (akin to married bachelors, an only child with siblings, etc).

While not physical evidence, reason would be able to provide good grounds for rejecting God’s existence. In fact, pure reason in this sense may even superior to any sort of physical evidence conceivably, as scientific hypotheses regarding physical data are tentative, whereas strictly pure reason is not (eg. the laws of logic do not change).

‘Reason 1) Using this line of thought can lead us to deny the existence of things that aren’t yet known but could one day be discovered.’

“Could we get a list of those things? I wouldn’t want to dismiss any ideas prematurely.”

Sure. Here are four: the existence of intelligent extra-terrestrial life, species thought to have gone extinct, other universes, undiscovered art, literature, and musical pieces.

It has been repeatedly explained you that your saying absence of evidence is not evidence of absence is not true. You seem not to realise that were you correct it would render science impossible. Nothing could be known in science, however provisionally. I note you do not bother to address your woeful ignorance when you did not know all knowledge is provisional. Well, if I had said something that stupid I might want to forget I had said it, but say it your did and fail to acknowledge your error you did. Count five in the dishonesty stats I think. You sure do lie a lot.

I was rather hoping that if we had to hear from you again it would be to apologise. Well that hope has been dashed. You are are dishonest and ignorant as ever.

And we are still waiting for you to explain why Catholicism is not hostile to women. Another claim you made and have not been able to support. I cannot call that a new lie, unless I count your failure to address your dishonesty as a lie, and I think I will.

I think this guy is the greatest Dunning-Kruger case I’ve seen in a while around here. Hey, philo, please let us know when you do use those precious screencaps!

The fact that an idiot comes and starts trying to poke “philosophical” holes in someone’s personal story and trying to pass as a sophisticated thinker while at the same time trying to keep his own agenda hidden hasn’t gone unnoticed.

As I said earlier, the biblical mandates for womanly submission are not as oppressive as they’re made out to be.

You seem to be ok with “a little” oppression.

I, and a lot of other women, are absolutely fucking not.

Stop trying to mansplain us, you condescending freak.

There is a jarring popular understanding prevalent today (in Christianity, for example) of what this “submission” is and I think it’s largely due to the acceptance of doctrines with little or no scriptural support.

Who the fuck cares ?

Scripture is self-contradictory. Its all a bunch of made up bullshit. It can be used to justify anything under the sun. From slavery to genocide.

I think, when all of the relevant passages are read together, the New Testament concept of womanly submission is much different than it’s made out to be. It is not gender enslavement.

That’s laughably easy to say when you are not its victim.

No, no, no, having to be told what to do by my fucking husband or younger brother is not demeaning at all. Being treated as a fucking minor with no will of her own while being an adult is just a minor point, is it ?

I should be happy to be all “protected” so that I can fullfill my only important role in life, that of spawning good healthy males. ’cause you know, that’s my wonderful, god-given purpose, don’t cha know.

How the freaking fuck, pray tell, is that not slavery ?

Slave == someone who has his/her purpose decided for him/her by people who “know better”.

If you use the word to mean “that which tends to prove or disprove something”, then obviously your examples don’t work- not finding animals that feed on sulfur compounds around ocean floor vents, for example, does not make the proposition,

“P1: There are no animals that feed on sulfur compounds around ocean floor vents.”

true until new evidence is uncovered. – philo

Of course neither evidence nor its absence makes a proposition true or false. The proposition P is true if and only if what P asserts is actually the case. But when you have reason to expect that if P is true, a certain kind of evidence will be available, if you have followed a procedure which should turn up that evidence if it exists, and you don’t find it, it is rational to believe that P is false. In the case you cite, if you have examined all the ocean floor vents, and have not found animals that feed on sulfur compunds, it is rational to believe that there are no such animals around such vents. Even if you know you have not examined all vents, but have examined vents in a wide variety of settings, and have reason to believe others will be similar with respect to the fauna found there, it is rational to believe this. It could be mistaken, but it would still be rational.

Philo, are you really completely neutral, neither believing nor disbelieving, in the case of werewolves, Russell’s teapot, and the invisible, inaudible, intangible and generally undetectable unicorn in my garage? If so, I recommend that you consult a competent mental health specialist. If not, how do these cases differ from that of gods?

It has been repeatedly explained you that your saying absence of evidence is not evidence of absence is not true. You seem not to realise that were you correct it would render science impossible.”

No, it would not render science impossible. You guys should pick up a good philosophy of science book. There is nothing theistic about what I’m sharing here (and thus no reason for you to reject it, since it’s becoming very clear that’s the only reason you disagree with me on this matter). Also, no one seems to have come back and responded to the defeaters I’ve given and so until someone does, every post I read that accuses me of dishonesty or being “dense” I’ll assume is just another ad hominem attack.

“Nothing could be known in science, however provisionally. I note you do not bother to address your woeful ignorance when you did not know all knowledge is provisional. Well, if I had said something that stupid I might want to forget I had said it, but say it your did and fail to acknowledge your error you did. Count five in the dishonesty stats I think. You sure do lie a lot.”

Does being so rude ever get old to you guys? Because, frankly, it’s starting to become tired, trite and (somewhat ironically) very preachy. If you have an argument or a defeater, feel free to post it. Otherwise, why even bother writing stuff like this? You know you aren’t making a good point. I know you aren’t making a good point. Anyone else who reads this knows you aren’t making a good point. Save face now and stop while you’re ahead.

I think, when all of the relevant passages are read together, the New Testament concept of womanly submission is much different than it’s made out to be. It is not gender enslavement. – philo

Your revolting misogyny aside (the very notion of “womanly submission” would make any non-misogynist want to vomit), the pretence that you are not here to push any one religion is wearing very thin indeed philo. If you are not a Christian, what makes you think that Biblical interpretation is of the slightest relevance to anything? As kemist says, the Bible is a load of made-up bullshit – something blindingly obvious to anyone not suffering from religious delusions from its stupidity, ignorance, irrationality and internal contradictions.

Since I have dealt with your so-called “defeater” concerning sulfur-eating vent animals, and your so-called “defeater” concerning extra-terrestrial life, I suggest you respond to those points, rather than assuring us all once again of your superiority.

No, it would not render science impossible. You guys should pick up a good philosophy of science book. There is nothing theistic about what I’m sharing here (and thus no reason for you to reject it, since it’s becoming very clear that’s the only reason you disagree with me on this matter). Also, no one seems to have come back and responded to the defeaters I’ve given and so until someone does, every post I read that accuses me of dishonesty or being “dense” I’ll assume is just another ad hominem attack.

Oh dear. Well I thought it might be the case, but you have confirmed it, You do not even know what an ad hominem attack. It is not, as you think, simply calling you name. People have been pointing your mistakes (which you too often fail to admit or even address) and calling you dishonest. Well you are dishonest, so let’s not have any complaints from you about that, and you are not very bright, so dense is an apt description as well.

Does being so rude ever get old to you guys? Because, frankly, it’s starting to become tired, trite and (somewhat ironically) very preachy. If you have an argument or a defeater, feel free to post it. Otherwise, why even bother writing stuff like this? You know you aren’t making a good point. I know you aren’t making a good point. Anyone else who reads this knows you aren’t making a good point. Save face now and stop while you’re ahead.

I see no reason to be polite to someone who is as dishonest as you. You have repeatedly lied, been caught lying and then just ignored us when your lies have been pointed out to you. For example, you claimed Christianity is not hostile to women, but when the position of the RCC on abortion and birth control was mentioned did you realise you had something untrue ? No, you just ignored it. You lied about the nature of Christianity, and then ignoring people who showed you lied you were dishonest.

Now normally I might suggest you apologise, but in your case I suggest you just fuck off and take a porcupine with you.

Why assume that Eve’s punishment was a “lie” rather than just those women failing to live up to a biblical principle?

Maybe because of the obvious problems with the story?

1) Self-contradiction: The idea that all women for all eternity are cursed due to the mistake of one woman way back when is completely incompatible with the idea of justice and mercy.

2) Inanity: that all parties of Category A (women) should submit to all parties of Category B (men), regardless of the relative level of competence of both parties, is inane on its face.

3) Self-serving: “Blah, blah, blah, blah, and therefore you should do whatever I say, forever, amen.” A painfully inept and transparent power grab.

For someone to tell you such a confection with a straight face, and then insist that you submit to their will as a result, either: a) their preposterous story is true, despite there being no evidence beyond the story itself, and flying in the face of fairness, reason, and personal observation; or b) you are being flagrantly lied to by a con artist in order for him to get something out of you, an event for which there is as much evidence as you wish, to be found in all other spheres of interaction. Occam’s Razor tells you exactly which is the more reasonable answer.

Could we get a list of those things? I wouldn’t want to dismiss any ideas prematurely.”

Sure. Here are four: the existence of intelligent extra-terrestrial life, species thought to have gone extinct, other universes, undiscovered art, literature, and musical pieces.

Let’s take the species thought to have gone extinct. Now, if we’re talking about an inconspicuous species that was recently extant, yes, it is rational to remain open to the possibility that it is not extinct. But how about Apatosaurus ajax? I suppose it’s possible intelligent aliens took specimens away during the Cretaceous and have been breeding them ever since, but let’s set that remote possibility aside, and confine ourselves to the surface of the Earth. Are you really contending that the absence of evidence for any surviving members of the species on this planet is not evidence that it is absent?

In the state of an absence of evidence you do not, by default, reason negatively (or positively for that matter). Unless the referent is a logically incoherent concept, neutrality is always the default, not negation.

The burden of proof is on those making a positive statement, in this case, there is evidence that The Big Guy In The Sky™ exists. In the absence of such evidence, atheists conclude the likelihood of TBGITS™ existing is so close to zero as to be effectively zero. As soon as you or any other goddist comes up with reasonable, rational, falsifiable evidence for TBGITS™, then we’ll start believing. Until then, we don’t believe in TBGITS™.

What you seem to be missing is that TBGITS™’s existence is an either/or situation. Either TBGITS™ exists or it doesn’t. “Neutrality”, which is apparently maybe, conceivably, feasibly, perchance it could possibly be true, it’s not impossible that peradventure TBGITS™ exists or not, as the case may be, is not an option.

Let’s take the species thought to have gone extinct. Now, if we’re talking about an inconspicuous species that was recently extant, yes, it is rational to remain open to the possibility that it is not extinct.

And here is the thing, if you were to talk to scientists who study that species they would admit that it would seem to be extinct but they could rule out the possibility that small populations might yet survive. It is not that uncommon for species that were thought to be extinct, if not totally, then at least in a specific locale, to later be found alive and probably not exactly well.

“Of course neither evidence nor its absence makes a proposition true or false. The proposition P is true if and only if what P asserts is actually the case. But when you have reason to expect that if P is true, a certain kind of evidence will be available, if you have followed a procedure which should turn up that evidence if it exists, and you don’t find it, it is rational to believe that P is false. In the case you cite, if you have examined all the ocean floor vents, and have not found animals that feed on sulfur compunds, it is rational to believe that there are no such animals around such vents. Even if you know you have not examined all vents, but have examined vents in a wide variety of settings, and have reason to believe others will be similar with respect to the fauna found there, it is rational to believe this. It could be mistaken, but it would still be rational.”

Agreed. And that inference is very reasonable, you’re absolutely right. The point I wanted to make here is that there is a misimpression many scientifically literate but philosophically naive people have which says knowledge is dependent on empirical evidence, and that any claims that are by their nature outside of the domain of science are either false, unknowable, or both. This simply is not the case. Anyone who believes that knowledge is dependent on empirical evidence needs to look into the progress that’s been made in reformed epistemology.

“Philo, are you really completely neutral, neither believing nor disbelieving, in the case of werewolves, Russell’s teapot, and the invisible, inaudible, intangible and generally undetectable unicorn in my garage?”

I am not neutral. I find these things listed very implausible. I do not say they do not exist (their non existence is not due to some logical impossibility in the same way a “married bachelor” is) but that doesn’t mean I think it’s likely they do exist. I’m somewhat neutral with an inclination toward disbelief.

“If so, I recommend that you consult a competent mental health specialist. If not, how do these cases differ from that of gods?

Haha. Well I think they differ from gods in a fairly obvious way: the philosophical conception of God has explanatory power that unicorns, teapots, etc. lack. God- in Western philosophy, at least- is thought to be a creator of the cosmos. A necessary being, God is maximally great, timeless and seems to be a good explanation for some of philosophy’s oldest questions- what is “the Good”? Why is there something rather than nothing? Are there objective moral truths to be learned and what are they grounded in? All these questions philosophers have for millenia argued about, and out of all of the available alternatives the God hypothesis has persisted throughout the ages because of its explanatory scope and power.

I assume philo keeps a good supply of garlic in hand, and has plenty of mirrors on his walls. After all, if we are not justified in taking the absence of evidence for vampires as evidence of absence, this would merely be prudent.

I am not neutral. I find these things listed very implausible. I do not say they do not exist (their non existence is not due to some logical impossibility in the same way a “married bachelor” is) but that doesn’t mean I think it’s likely they do exist. I’m somewhat neutral with an inclination toward disbelief.

Why ? You have being arguing that the lack of evidence they exist says nothing about how implausible their existence is. You should be strictly neutral, so it would seem you not even believe the crap your have spouting youself.

How fucking neutral are you, fuckface, when you condemn one woman’s reason for leaving the religion she was brought up in as not being thoughtful enough. And how fucking neutral are you when you argue that being told to submit is not so bad?

I assume philo keeps a good supply of garlic in hand, and has plenty of mirrors on his walls. After all, if we are not justified in taking the absence of evidence for vampires as evidence of absence, this would merely be prudent.

But the absence of a reflection would be absence of evidence, which tells you nothing!

I can only suppose Philo does not know, and has never talked to, a single scientist, because one thing is sure, if he had he would have been told that in science if you find no evidence for something, and you keep finding no evidence then that is evidence that what you are looking for does not exist.

The scientists at CERN certainly think that. They are looking for the Higg’s boson, and are very open that if their experiments do not find it then that will be evidence is does not exist. The LHC was built to find the Higg’s. Does Philo really think that billions have been wasted as a result of scientists not knowing how to do their job ?

“You don’t answer to anyone here who’s identified herself as female, except to indirectly mansplain to us, you fucking condescending misogynist assclam.’
I had not actually noticed that, but it seems like you are right. The more he craps on the more vile he becomes.”

The ending of that first sentence is exactly why “they’ve” been ignored. If you can’t get your point across without profanity, rudeness or any other sort of offensive language then you probably don’t have any arguments worthy of consideration. That’s an assumption I make, at least, when I have these conversations. It’s a judgment I’ve found to be pretty accurate, too. If you’re a female that I haven’t responded to, please bear in mind:

1) I am not paying any attention to the names of the posts.
2) I am responding mostly to posts I feel have made an argument or point that deserves a thoughtful response.
3) I may have missed your comment. If you’ve made a post that you think deserves a response, just let me know.

All these questions philosophers have for millenia argued about, and out of all of the available alternatives the God hypothesis has persisted throughout the ages because of its explanatory scope and power.

“Explanatory power” ?

God has just as much explanatory power as “just because”.

God answers difficult questions by creating even more difficult questions, such as where does God comes from ?

Answering that God “always was” is adding unnecessary steps – you could posit that the universe “always was”, and be done with it without having to explain the presence of an infinitely powerful and perfect being pulled out of the void – one might say out of your ass.

The ending of that first sentence is exactly why “they’ve” been ignored. If you can’t get your point across without profanity, rudeness or any other sort of offensive language then you probably don’t have any arguments worthy of consideration. That’s an assumption I make, at least, when I have these conversations. It’s a judgment I’ve found to be pretty accurate, too. If you’re a female that I haven’t responded to, please bear in mind:

Seems like an admission you are ignoring the women commentators to me. I note you have lied yet again. I have lost track of how many lies that is now.

What a vile fucking sack of shit you are.

Please fuck off and die you lying misogynist scumbag. I suspect when PZ gets Internet access back you will not be given a choice anyway.

And how fucking neutral are you when you argue that being told to submit is not so bad?

Oh Janine, you know it’s all about the mansperience. If Philo the Manz doesn’t mansperience it, why it doesn’t count! Here he is, being all gracious to us unthoughtful ingrate bitches* by saying it *might* happen. Maybe. But not really.

*Hypothetically speaking, because we all know there are no women on Pharyngula. Except Nerd.

The ending of that first sentence is exactly why “they’ve” been ignored.

And you notice just when an identified male points it out ?

I totally believe you, man. You’ve been like, totally honest.

My first posts didn’t have any “profanity” in them, cupcake. They just addressed your disgusting justification of “female submission” (a vomit-inducing concept if there is one). To which never answered directly, but just waffled about being “not-so-bad” to other males.

The point I wanted to make here is that there is a misimpression many scientifically literate but philosophically naive people have which says knowledge is dependent on empirical evidence, and that any claims that are by their nature outside of the domain of science are either false, unknowable, or both. This simply is not the case.

Taking science to include all forms of empirical enquiry (so as to include history for example) it simply is the case for knowledge of the world – as opposed to knowledge of mathematics and logic (again, broadly conceived – there are aspects of logic that are not captured by any existing logical formalism).

Anyone who believes that knowledge is dependent on empirical evidence needs to look into the progress that’s been made in reformed epistemology.

Bwaw-haw-haw! “Reformed epistemology” is just a licence to believe anything you want by declaring it a “properly basic belief”. Wishful thinking raised to the status of a philosophical principle. But now at least we’re getting a glimpse of where you are coming from – fuckwits like Plantinga (was there ever such a stupid argument presented as supposedly serious philosophy as the “evolutionary argument against naturalism”?) are evidently your intellectual mentors.

Seriously? You should indeed consult a competent mental health professional.

God- in Western philosophy, at least- is thought to be a creator of the cosmos. A necessary being, God is maximally great, timeless and seems to be a good explanation for some of philosophy’s oldest questions- what is “the Good”? Why is there something rather than nothing? Are there objective moral truths to be learned and what are they grounded in? All these questions philosophers have for millenia argued about, and out of all of the available alternatives the God hypothesis has persisted throughout the ages because of its explanatory scope and power.

Complete and utter drivel. The idea of a creator god has no explanatory power whatsovever – it simply pushes the question back one stage – and the same is true for the question of why there is something rather than nothing – since a god, if one existed, would be something. The idea of a “necessary being”, other than abstract objects such as those of mathematics, is incoherent. The only meaning it can be given is that of something that must exist in all logically possible (or consistently describable) worlds; and there is nothing inconsistent in the concept of a godless universe. Nor does the notion of God successfully ground morality, as Euthyphro pointed out long ago. (And no, trying to make good or “the Good”, “God’s nature” doesn’t help – is it God’s nature because it is good, or is it good because it’s God’s nature?) The “God hypothesis” has persisted because of human ignorance, fear of death and suffering, and not least, the rope, the stake and the rack – as is shown by its retreat as science and more generally, rational enquiry have pushed back ignorance, science-based medicine and rational social policy have made life – at least in countries with a decent welfare system – more secure, and the religious have lost the power to torture and kill disbelievers.

“Let’s take the species thought to have gone extinct. Now, if we’re talking about an inconspicuous species that was recently extant, yes, it is rational to remain open to the possibility that it is not extinct. But how about Apatosaurus ajax? I suppose it’s possible intelligent aliens took specimens away during the Cretaceous and have been breeding them ever since, but let’s set that remote possibility aside, and confine ourselves to the surface of the Earth. Are you really contending that the absence of evidence for any surviving members of the species on this planet is not evidence that it is absent?”

Well when I used that example I had aquatic animals in mind (C. megalodon, to name one specifically). As for whether or not Apatosaurus ajax still exists, no, you’re probably right in assuming that they’ve all gone extinct. The reason for believing they’re extinct, however, isn’t the absence of evidence. We know that all non-avian dinosaurs went extinct about 65 million years ago and so we base our belief that they’re extinct on this.

To which never answered directly, but just waffled about being “not-so-bad” to other males.

Not sure why he did that. Do you think he really though he could convince us that keeping women submissive could be justified ? If so rhe hypocritical misogynistic lying sack of shit is even more stupid than I thought, and I did not think I could think of something being more stupid.

Well when I used that example I had aquatic animals in mind (C. megalodon, to name one specifically). As for whether or not Apatosaurus ajax still exists, no, you’re probably right in assuming that they’ve all gone extinct. The reason for believing they’re extinct, however, isn’t the absence of evidence. We know that all non-avian dinosaurs went extinct about 65 million years ago and so we base our belief that they’re extinct on this.

Just to remind you, you are a hypocritical misogynistic lying sack of shit. Would not want you to forget that.

If you can’t get your point across without profanity, rudeness or any other sort of offensive language then you probably don’t have any arguments worthy of consideration. That’s an assumption I make, at least, when I have these conversations.

Point of order: that’s an invalid assumption. Offensive language has no bearing on the validity of an argument. (Neither does nice polite language.) Besides, use of profanity doesn’t mean the speaker can’t get a point across without it; particularly in this space where profanity is specifically permitted.

What you’re actually saying, philo, is that you arbitrarily refuse to consider arguments because of your own personal preference, and further use this arbitrary standard as an excuse to pass judgment on the speaker. Here, misogyny’s far uglier than a few icky words.

Do you think he really though he could convince us that keeping women submissive could be justified ?

I notice philo hasn’t bothered to actually make substantial arguments on the topic at all. Nothing but “it isn’t so bad”.

What I was pointing out was that even such minor levels of womanly-submission as delegating chores, are already unfair and contradictory even within Christian doctrine as it was explained to me. There is no non-arbitrary justification for one gender washing dishes while the other rests; in fact it contradicts principles of respect, compassion, forgiveness, and resting on the Sabbath, and undermines the concept of sin.

While noticing this doesn’t directly address the existence of gods or not, arbitrary and contradictory rules with BS explanations ARE reliable indicators of bad arguments, and reason to withdraw credibility from those who espouse such arguments.

“Complete and utter drivel. The idea of a creator god has no explanatory power whatsovever – it simply pushes the question back one stage – and the same is true for the question of why there is something rather than nothing – since a god, if one existed, would be something.”

The God hypothesis does have explanatory power regarding the question, “Why is there something rather than nothing?” because if God is a necessary being then the existence of contingent objects is adequately explained.

“The idea of a “necessary being”, other than abstract objects such as those of mathematics, is incoherent. The only meaning it can be given is that of something that must exist in all logically possible (or consistently describable) worlds; and there is nothing inconsistent in the concept of a godless universe.”

There is an inconsistency in the concept of a godless “universe” (referred to as “world” hereafter). God is a necessary being, and a godless world is impossible because a feature of a necessary being is existence in all possible worlds. Given that the argument from contingency establishes a metaphysically necessary something, and the only alternatives are a personal or impersonal cause, because the impersonal cause (the natural world) is finite in the past it cannot possibly serve as an explanation for why there is something rather than nothing since it is itself contingent and finite.

“Nor does the notion of God successfully ground morality, as Euthyphro pointed out long ago. (And no, trying to make good or “the Good”, “God’s nature” doesn’t help – is it God’s nature because it is good, or is it good because it’s God’s nature?)”

God’s nature is necessarily “good”. Goodness is a property of God’s nature. Asking why God’s nature is “good” is asking, “Why is God’s nature like God’s nature?” The Euthyphro Dilemma is a false dilemma.

The God hypothesis does have explanatory power regarding the question, “Why is there something rather than nothing?” because if God is a necessary being then the existence of contingent objects is adequately explained.

No, shit for brains, the god hypothesis has exactly ZERO explanatory power. All it does is push the creation of the universe back one step. Who created the creator? You goddists (and don’t try to pretend you’re not a Christian goddist) come up with “gawd always existed” or suchlike meaningless bullshit.

God is a necessary being, and a godless world is impossible because a feature of a necessary being is existence in all possible worlds.

More meaningless bullshit. TBGITS™ is necessary for what? What the fuck does “a necessary being is existence in all possible worlds” mean? Is this some of that sophistimatcated philosophilogy that everyone else calls bullshit?

The ending of that first sentence is exactly why “they’ve” been ignored. If you can’t get your point across without profanity, rudeness or any other sort of offensive language then you probably don’t have any arguments worthy of consideration.

More mysogynist bullshit.

1) I am not paying any attention to the names of the posts.

Right. It is just pure coincidence, right? What are the odds that the ones you think have not made a good point are the women?

And it is quite possible to make a good fucking argument while using naughty words.

Here’s an example:

If I say, “Yes, the fucking fossil record shows quite fucking clearly that sauropod diversity changed over about 20 Ma from a majority with broad-crowned teeth to a majority with narrow crowned teeth, you asshole!” that is a good argument with naughty words.

If I say, “Oh, my good man, you seem to display a truly alarming tendency to ignore commenters with feminine ‘nyms and most definately are therefore wearing a French maid outfit with a featherduster inserted firmly in your left nostril,” that is a bad argument but has no naughty words.

The reason for believing they’re extinct, however, isn’t the absence of evidence. We know that all non-avian dinosaurs went extinct about 65 million years ago and so we base our belief that they’re extinct on this.

According to the propaganda your god is a sadistic, narcissistic bully with the emotional maturity of a spoiled six year old. He kills people just because he can. If this god is good then what the fuck do you consider evil?

The Euthyphro Dilemma is a false dilemma.

I see the Euthyphro Dilemma is yet another topic you know zip point shit about.

The God hypothesis does have explanatory power regarding the question, “Why is there something rather than nothing?” because if God is a necessary being then the existence of contingent objects is adequately explained.

Which totally ignores the thousands of peer-reviewed papers arguing about the Big Bang Theory. And none of them invoke gods. None.

I am responding mostly to posts I feel have made an argument or point that deserves a thoughtful response.

That is the one demanding physical evidence for whatever you claim, be it your imaginary deity, your stupid and illogical and utterly falsified idea the babble (hence most Xian religions) doesn’t denigrate women.

Your claims of thoughtful conversation is so much bullshit. Either you are a person of honesty and ingtegrity or not. If you are, either put up the conclusive physical evidence or shut the fuck up. If you can’t put up or shut up, you tacitly acknowledge you are nothing but a presupposition liar and bullshitter who will amorally say anything to defend an omnipotent and omnipresent imaginary deity…Who obviously doesn’t need your help if it fit the definitions of a deity…

“the god hypothesis has exactly ZERO explanatory power. All it does is push the creation of the universe back one step. Who created the creator?”

This question seems to make the assumption that everything has an explanation of it’s existence in some other cause, and this is just mistaken. God cannot have a cause because God is timeless and eternal. You seem like this subject has frustrated you in the past. What specifically about this do you object to?

“God is a necessary being, and a godless world is impossible because a feature of a necessary being is existence in all possible worlds. How awesome it must be, to use your definition as your proof. Would sure make maths exams a lot easier:

This one actually made me laugh. Well if it came off as me just defining God as being a necessary being that’s because, given the general tone of this conversation it seems like it wouldn’t really go anywhere branching off into de re and de dicto modalities.

“Right. It is just pure coincidence, right? What are the odds that the ones you think have not made a good point are the women?”

Read the posts the women have written. They haven’t been very sensible and lack anything worth responding to. That’s not to say they aren’t able to write something, only that they haven’t yet. Or no, wait- an absence of evidence means evidence of absence, right? I guess I’ll have to take that back because, due to the lack of evidence, it’s a fact: Women definitely aren’t able to write anything worth responding to. ;)

“I see the Euthyphro Dilemma is yet another topic you know zip point shit about.”

This should be interesting. Go on. Enlighten me.

“Which totally ignores the thousands of peer-reviewed papers arguing about the Big Bang Theory. And none of them invoke gods. None.”

Read the posts the women have written. They haven’t been very sensible and lack anything worth responding to. That’s not to say they aren’t able to write something, only that they haven’t yet. Or no, wait- an absence of evidence means evidence of absence, right? I guess I’ll have to take that back because, due to the lack of evidence, it’s a fact: Women definitely aren’t able to write anything worth responding to.

Assertion made without evidence, so it can be dismissed without evidence. Try again evidenceless fuckwit, and it had better be physical, not mental masturbation like the above fuckwittery to find a tiny gap to hide your failed delusion it.

Still no evidence from Philo the mental masturbator, but then none was expected. He is incapable of evidence, as he knows the evidence refutes his beliefs. Show us wrong by actually presenting scientific and/or physical evidence for your claims sophist. You aren’t a philosopher, just a SQUAWK parrot giving preapproved, but prerefuted, apologetics.

So philo, if women aren’t capable of writing anything worth responding to, since the OP was written by a woman, then you had no reason to make THE VERY FIRST comment on this thread in the first place. Sheesh.

God cannot have a cause because God is timeless and eternal. You seem like this subject has frustrated you in the past. What specifically about this do you object to?

I object to your use of the logical fallacy called special pleading. You’re claiming everything was created except for one thing. What’s your evidence that TBGITS™ wasn’t created but is “timeless and eternal”? That’s just more bullshit you assert with zero justification.

By the way, fuckwit, how much oppression should women put up with? Where’s the line between a sufficiency of oppression and a surfeit of oppression?

“So philo, if women aren’t capable of writing anything worth responding to, since the OP was written by a woman, then you had no reason to make THE VERY FIRST comment on this thread in the first place. Sheesh. Well, except for being a misogynist jackass. Gotta shame ‘em all.”

Read the posts the women have written. They haven’t been very sensible and lack anything worth responding to. That’s not to say they aren’t able to write something, only that they haven’t yet. Or no, wait- an absence of evidence means evidence of absence, right? I guess I’ll have to take that back because, due to the lack of evidence, it’s a fact: Women definitely aren’t able to write anything worth responding to. ;)

A bit of advice :

Never, ever say that to a woman’s (other than your properly submissive wife if there is a woman unlucky enough to be married to you) face.

You might be missing few teeth afterwards. And everybody else will applaud.

Yawn still no conclusive physical evidence for your imaginary, and essentially tacitly denied deity Philo. That is what happens when you can’t put up or shut up. Your lies and bullshit are exposed for what they are. Your lies and bullshit.

I’ve been at this all day and it’s a shame because only a few of you made this conversation interesting. Anyway, I’m a little sleepy so I’m going to take a nap now. I’ll get back on a little later. Feel free to continue making great arguments!

Yes we are. No you aren’t. Typical Cat-O-Lick approved lying and bullshitting apologetics. Been there, refuted that, nothing but boredom for the horde while they sharpen their fangs on your carcass of stupid and idiotic philosophy known as theology.

Now if I added a winking emoticon at the end of my last statement, would that make me really patronizing?

Oh, yeah.

And then when I don’t do my famous girly laught, you could use that when talking to the manly men (the real adults here), as evidence that our pink gurly brains don’t get his super-speeshul manly sense of humor, ’cause they’re not as good as men-brainz.

philo, you are by far the rudest person in this thread, so I don’t think you should be surprised that people have responded rudely to you. In fact, I think there is far more politeness going on than you deserve.

Let’s fix that.

Your arguments in this thread are nothing we haven’t seen before. Many people here managed to climb out of the cesspit of idiocy in which you are still immersed up to your eyebrows, and one cannot do so without encountering bankrupt apologetics such as yours upon the way. The difference between you and them is that your ability to critique a philosophical argument is languishing in the Dark Ages along with sophists like Thomas Aquinas, while they, whether because of superior intelligence, superior education, or mere willingness to learn, have advanced into the modern world and can employ highly effective modern tools like science and observation, which you can as little hope to understand as the cockroaches that infest your empty brain case can hope to understand quantum physics.

Perhaps you thought you could bushwhack us with your “sophistimacated theology”. That might be effective on the intellectual dwarves that undoubtedly form the bulk of your associates (which association has clearly been detrimental to your mental development), but you are now dealing with people who can reason for themselves, who can clearly perceive the muck in which you are so happily wallowing, and further perceive that it is not merely covering you up to your eyebrows but is in fact issuing forth from your various orifices in abundance.

As I said before, whatever school you went to has let you down badly (unless it was in fact a religious school, in which case you got exactly what you paid for). To give a passing grade to someone so utterly inept as you is cruel, and could only give you false hopes.

Perhaps you should try the apologetics on the porcupine, which I assure you will serve as a most attentive audience, and will never say anything rude to you no matter how tightly you wedge it into your nether regions. As for its rhetorical skills, admittedly they are not yet at the level of your average three-year-old, but that is the level at which one of your intellectual capacity should begin study of the subject.

Sandra,
Thanks for writing the post. It certainly hit a nerve with the odd clueless person, that’s for sure (philo, I’m looking at you).

camelspotter@20 said:

I guess you can’t fool a smart child into hating herself,

, which reads as intending to affirm your post.

My problem with this comment is that it indirectly labels the girls who do get sucked into the church’s misogyny as “not smart”. Smart girls can and do get suckered into this trap – it’s a matter of trust or fear rather than intelligence. It is of course true that it is smart to avoid the trap.

The God hypothesis does have explanatory power regarding the question, “Why is there something rather than nothing?” because if God is a necessary being then the existence of contingent objects is adequately explained.

Wow, this is silly.

If causes are required, all thing require causes. Including all things. Yes, even that thing.
That one too.
And that one.
Yes, Timmy, even the green thing.

If causes are not required, causes are not required.

By the way, we now know that some things are uncaused – they simply happen. Causes are not required, and god therefore cannot hide behind this particular threadbare cloth anymore.

As a ‘deep’ philosophical question, philo, what would say is the difference in the evidence for a god that created the universe and one who was incapable of creating the universe?
And if there is no more evidence for one that the other, why preferentially believe in one?

Aw shucks. Misogynist shitlord took his toys and went home? But now I’ll never understand the level of oppression that is proper for a woman to experience!

I note that he linked to Hitchens. Like every authoritarian, he assumes that other people think like he does. Just because Hitch says it doesn’t mean we all agree, assclam. Hitch was a great writer, erudite and witty and funny, and excellent in a debate as well. But he was wrong about some stuff. A lot of the stuff he was wrong about involved women.

Example: Suppose Casey murders Caylee. Furthermore, suppose Casey murders Caylee in such a way that during the investigation no incriminating evidence is found to tie her to Caylee’s murder. Given that the proposition,

P1: Caylee was murdered by Casey.

is true if Casey really did murder her, and is not true if she did not, consider what happens when we employ this line of reasoning to the situation:

There is no evidence that Casey murdered Caylee.
Therefore, ~P1 (or, “Casey did not murder Caylee.”)

It doesn’t hold up. Sure, the lack of evidence may be enough to get Casey a “not guilty” verdict, but this is much different than making the negation of the proposition,

P1: Caylee was murdered by Casey.

true. It is still true that Caylee was murdered by Casey. The truth of the proposition does not change (or does not become negated, rather) simply because an investigation yields nothing.

I pity the defendant if you are a juror on a murder trial.

I presume this is what 5 years of studying theology does to some peoples’ way of thinking.

Being wrong about something doesn’t necessarily diminish the greatness of the person either. For example, Isaac Newton was great. Undeniably great. It doesn’t mean that he was right about alchemy, prolific on the subject though he was.

It’s why science works: the arguments and the evidence are far more important than the person, much as we may appreciate the person (or not).

The God hypothesis does have explanatory power regarding the question, “Why is there something rather than nothing?” because if God is a necessary being then the existence of contingent objects is adequately explained.

This is an example of circular reasoning, also known as begging the question.

God cannot have a cause because God is timeless and eternal.

This is special pleading.

So sophistimacted theologie depends on logical fallacies. And Philo wonders why we’re not impressed by his arguments.

The more I read of people (I use the word loosely) like philo, the more I appreciate the great good fortune of all those of us lucky enough to live in societies where he and his ilk do not wield actual power. And the more I hate the fact that so many of us are forced to live under systems run by people who believe as he does.

And I almost forgot to thank SG for the OP! Heartening to read of someone who started seeing through religion’s tissue of lies at 8 years old, and has clearly gone from strength to strength ever since.

Funny how fuckwitted idjits think they can talk theology without conclusive physical for their imaginary deity, and conclusive physical evidence that the babble is inerrant first. After all, their theology is based on the presumptions of their deity and holy book being true, but with without that conclusive evidence, both presumptions are false (null hypothesis). All it means is that they talk meaningless nonsense, thinking they are being cogent, as Philo so aptly shows. Meaningless word salad does not a well evidenced argument make. Evidence that is solid and physical wins.

Which is why the gnu atheists can say there is no evidence for Philo’s imaginary deity. He has shown no evidence for it, and since he is making the claim for that deity, the burden of proof is upon him to show that evidence. We’re waiting Philo, and if you are a person of honor and integrity, you will put up that evidence or shut the fuck up about the claim. Liars and bullshitters can’t put up and can’t shut up.

So far, Philo has shown great lying and bullshitting ability, and that those who proclaim a deity like he does are also liars and bullshitters just like him. Not setting a good example Philo.

Being wrong about something doesn’t necessarily diminish the greatness of the person either. For example, Isaac Newton was great. Undeniably great. It doesn’t mean that he was right about alchemy, prolific on the subject though he was.

“Being a genius is no excuse for being… dead wrong.”
– Carl Sagan,Cosmos

By the way, we now know that some things are uncaused – they simply happen. Causes are not required, and god therefore cannot hide behind this particular threadbare cloth anymore.

Would it matter even if a cause could be shown to be required? The Argument from contingency (and its family of related arguments) has always struck me as an equivocation fallacy. Well, I am told that it is actually a whole collection of equivocation fallacies, but the one that stands out to me is the one around the use of the word ’cause’.

In the argument ’cause’ starts out as the general concept; the first half of a cause and effect relationship. By the end of the argument ’cause’ has transmuted into an entity, a “something”, and eventually a “necessary being”. But that is not a valid step because things can be caused by absence of things; Asphyxia is caused by the absence of oxygen, falling by the absence of physical support. In the general sense causes are not exclusively entities. Thus even if a ’cause’ were required that would not be enough to necessitate the existence of an entity to be that cause. There isn’t actually a ‘necessary’ to back up any assertion of “necessary being” even if the rest of the argument is accepted.

“p(E|H2) = 1.0 <== obviously if there's no God there cannot be evidence, so the probability is 1.0"

This seems wrong. If there is no God, there could be evidence or good reasons for knowing this to be so. Consider if the concept of God was a logically incoherent idea (akin to married bachelors, an only child with siblings, etc).

I was only dealing with whether absence of evidence is evidence of absence. (Obviously a logically incoherent God does not need evidence or statistical inference to rule out).

You’re talking about absence of evidence for absence of a God.

An all-powerful God is an all-powerful cause, therefore no observation is ever inconsistent with this hypothesis. There will always be a way to claim an observation has not ruled out such a God. More generally, there is never a way to rule out the possibility that our observations are limited in some way eg to some lower dimensional version of reality. Therefore, all we can ever say is that the reality we can detect seems to lack a God.

But that is not a valid step because things can be caused by absence of things; Asphyxia is caused by the absence of oxygen, falling by the absence of physical support. In the general sense causes are not exclusively entities.

Hmm, I think I understand what you’re saying here, but this in particular might not be the best example. One could turn it around by arguing that asphyxia isn’t something that is caused, but rather a lack of a thing (life function supported by oxygen) also caused by a lack of a thing (oxygen).

It is certainly an equivocation fallacy in terms of trying to assume that a mysterious ‘uncaused cause’ is anything recognizable as any sort of deity posited by any major world religion. It’s just a desperate attempt to stick anything to the wall that you can hang the label “god” on.

Just because Hitch says it doesn’t mean we all agree, assclam. Hitch was a great writer, erudite and witty and funny, and excellent in a debate as well. But he was wrong about some stuff. A lot of the stuff he was wrong about involved women.

Hitch was a product of his time. His mild misogyny (it is mild compared with what was the norm at the time) is a bit like Darwin’s “racism”.

It takes a special kind of priviledge-blindness to assert that women don’t have a sense of humor just because they don’t laugh at sexist “jokes”, or to say the same thing of african-americans not laughing at racist “jokes”. And to go on to say that oh, these ones are funny because they make the very same sexist or racist “jokes” we’re just too PC to make anymore.

Why don’t women laugh about certain things ?

I’ll spell it out : it’s because they are still issues for us.

Our mental capacities ? Because not so long ago women were not allowed in universities. Because in certain places, you have to raise your voice so that people are forced to hear your opinion on technical subjects, about which men (and sometimes women) automatically assume that you have none because you do not possess a male organ.

Our appearence ? Because from the earliest childhood, we’re constantly drilled that the single most important thing for us is to please men, and that we won’t exist if don’t. You wouldn’t want to end up a bitter old maid surrounded with cats like aunty Gertrude, oh horror of horrors. No woman can ever have a fulfilling life without spawning a few times.

Household chores ? Because we always end up stuck with them, no matter what our level of disponibility or inclination.

I wonder how much men would have a good sense of humor if we started making jokes about their issues.

Let’s make jokes about erectile dysfunction and see how funny 50-ish men find them.

Does being so rude ever get old to you guys? Because, frankly, it’s starting to become tired, trite and (somewhat ironically) very preachy.

Does being a dishonest, condescending shitweasel ever get old to you? Because, frankly, it started to get tired, trite, and preachy yesterday.

If you can’t get your point across without profanity, rudeness or any other sort of offensive language then you probably don’t have any arguments worthy of consideration. That’s an assumption I make, at least, when I have these conversations.

As usual with your type, implying or outright claiming that a huge sector of humanity isn’t fully human is considered “polite,” but naughty words aren’t. This speaks a great deal about you, but because you have likely associated with similar wretches all your life, the lesson is probably lost on you.

If you’re a female…

Uh, we’re not “females.” We’re women. There’s another misogynist tell, the use of “females” as a noun (your ilk seldom does the same with “males”). I call bullshit that you haven’t been paying attention to names, for reasons enumerated by Pteryxx at #172, as well as on the idea that you somehow get to decide whose argument is worth responding to.

Caine, actually, he is a malodorous, peanut-studded, Ebola-infected smear of shit on the taint of the internet.

Ah, yes, the passive-aggressive winking smiley at the end of an obnoxious statement. Let me guess, you’re the sort who likes to make “Get back in the kitchen” jokes in meatspace with a nasty smile, then howl about how you were ONLY KIDDING, CAN’T YOU TAKE A JOKE, YOU FUCKING FEMINAZI?! when you get called out on it.

Echidna, #205: Thank you for saying this. Because, as it keeps having to be explained to certain, usually male, atheists who don’t understand forces of social pressure — especially those to which they have never been subjected — intelligence is orthogonal to psychological circumstances.

Trust me, Camelspotter, the smarter a girl is, the harder society works to make her hate herself, and oftentimes it succeeds.

Koskha:

I presume this is what 5 years of studying theology does to some peoples’ way of thinking.

It’s not surprising that an ascriber to authoritarian thought believes in “guilty until proven innocent.”

Kemist, I disagree that being “a product of his time” excuses or even explains Hitch’s misogyny. There are men currently in their 60s who are not misogynists. There are much younger men who are.

As for making fun of men’s issues, while it is of course not right, it is telling that men who have no problems making misogynist jokes start howling their heads off when the shoe’s on the other foot, despite the lack of societal oppression that backs up anti-male jokes.

I’m saying one needs to study theology (or at least some sort of philosophy) in order to have objections that rationally justify their disbelief.

Apologies to anyone else who may have responded to this item of Philo’s. I didn’t read the entire 222 or so replies before writing this.

Philo, no no no no and a thousand times no.

You need to go take classes on how to do science and then read a biography of Harry Houdini. The short version is that magic and paranormal stuff is make believe or tricks. How many card tricks and false bottoms do you need to see explained before you’re willing to junk the whole lot?

As for making fun of men’s issues, while it is of course not right, it is telling that men who have no problems making misogynist jokes start howling their heads off when the shoe’s on the other foot, despite the lack of societal oppression that backs up anti-male jokes.

Have you seen this Louis CK bit on being white (privileged)? Especially about the part that you can’t even hurt our feelings. Every time some MRA or a racist starts complaining about their perceived “equality”, it reminds me of what Louie says near the end.

Who knew that an off-the-cuff email written months ago would result in any sort of response? I guess I should have known that calling myself a feminist would bring out the trolls but I suppose my pink girlie brain felt the misogyny of the Abrahamic faiths was sufficiently established that I didn’t need to enumerate the theological and practical offenses. Actually, I still feel that way. If you don’t know that the Abrahamic faiths are misogynist, than either you haven’t been paying attention or you are invested in not seeing the truth. Either way, I’m not interested in re-writing what has already been written many, many, many times before (possibly even in this thread, as I haven’t gotten through all of it yet).

Philo – Honey, your concern for my academic success is truly touching. Just to put your mind at rest, I received 97% in Philosophy and Religion which over-shadowed the 96% I received in Aristotelian Logic the year before. However, both marks were sufficient to win me the Philosophy department’s book award for academic excellence two years in a row. Also, the chair of the Philosophy department encouraged me to change my major from History. I declined because I knew that my interest in Philosophy was maintained only by how it informed my study of History. What I found most distasteful about Philosophy was that the department was populated with self-important but not particularly bright pseudo-intellectuals, of whom there were fewer in the History department.

This isn’t universally true, of course, and the posturing seems to disappear once a PhD is achieved. I happen to be related to a very nice Philosophy prof who isn’t at all a lame-ass, pseudo-intellectual poseur who thinks a post on Pharyngula describing the moment a child discovered the truth about religion and set themselves on a path that led to committed atheism needs to be written like a fully-cited, sourced research paper.

Also, Philo, dear, please rest assured that I studied the theology of the Old and New Testaments, including reading the leading philosophers on religion. I did not pursue advanced or graduate studies in theology, as I preferred to study and write about things that could be proven to be true versus the philosophies behind fantasies. I see that a smart person up thread has already linked The Courtier’s Reply so I won’t belabour that point. (Having read through the thread, it seems you saw fit to dismiss the Reply. Huh. Are you sure you’ve studied it extensively enough to reject it? Where are your sources and arguments other than your stated argument that the linked page has a link to Sarah Palin – who we all know is a woman?) I have not studied Islam in any detailed or academic fashion but as I reject the existence of a supernatural world (except when I read Harry Potter or Tolkien) I do not feel the need to learn the philosophical basis of Islam’s oppression of women. I know the faith oppresses women and my mind won’t be changed about the oppression because someone can quote Mohammed’s assurance that it was okay with God to do it.

I see that you are arguing up thread that the Christian doctrine preaching the submission of women isn’t ‘as oppressive’ as we feminist make it seem. Well, I guess a little oppression is okay then… So long as it’s not you being oppressed, amirite? AMIRITE? Can I get a Hallelujah?!

Well, no, actually, I’m afraid you’re wrong. Any oppression (regardless of the quantum) is wrong but particularly when it comes at the behest of an all-loving, all-knowing, all-powerful God. That does not mean that, as a historian, I can’t acknowledge that the Church gave women a sort of freedom by offering a career (as a nun) as an option to marriage and motherhood (dangerous prospects prior to the advent of regular hand-washing). By today’s standards, a life of submission to the Church is no more liberating than a life of submission to one man. However, until very recently, depending on a woman’s financial/class situation, the Church was often the only career available for those who wanted more than their mothers.

So, naturally, the concepts of oppression and misogyny are not as simple as my 8 yr old self thought. I’ve grown up and studied a lot and learned a lot about the world, social justice and the intersectionalities of oppression.

Unfortunately for you Philo (and everyone on this thread who had to read your posts) I did not interpret the statement “Why I am an atheist” as “What years of study and experience has taught me about the world that informs my lack of faith, along with citations to relevant, peer-reviewed sources.” Nor, to the best of my recollection, have many of the other contributors to this meme treated the subject that way. I went back to the first moment I knew, without any evidence but my own reasoning, that the priests, nuns and teachers were lying about God and the faith (the two being synonymous for me at the time) and the aegis of that moment was my feminism.

It seems to me that you are either a believer in God (but then, why not attack every thread in this meme) or you are not a feminist or a supporter of feminist ideals. Either way, I assume there is nothing I could have written that would have changed your opinion on God or women.

So, you know, whatever.

Thanks to everyone who supported my essay, my feminism and my atheism on this thread. I’m sorry it flushed out a troll.

Thanks to everyone who supported my essay, my feminism and my atheism on this thread. I’m sorry it flushed out a troll.

No need to apologize. Anything with the hint of feminism is perfect troll bait though it is hard to predict when one will attract a particularly stubborn one like philo.

What is funny is this, it does seem that you done enough studying on the topic to reject your religious upbringing. Well, provided that philo thinks that you are interesting enough.

And I think most of us know the answer to that.

Also, you should know by now that many of the regulars love it when a troll like philo shows up. Funny how it only took a little prodding to get him to drop his lie of being neutral on the subject and to get him to show the range of his misogyny.

“An all-powerful God is an all-powerful cause, therefore no observation is ever inconsistent with this hypothesis. There will always be a way to claim an observation has not ruled out such a God. More generally, there is never a way to rule out the possibility that our observations are limited in some way eg to some lower dimensional version of reality. Therefore, all we can ever say is that the reality we can detect seems to lack a God.”

Well why would that be? All we can ever say is that the reality we can detect seems to lack a God? I don’t find this very compelling because I think we have good reasons to think our reality does contain a God, and not comparably good reasons to think that God does not exist. The finitude of a contingent universe seems a good example of this. Why does a contingent universe exist? Because the universe is not infinite in duration in its past, what can adequately explain why it exists? There seem to only be a few options: either the universe caused itself to exist, the universe (or some natural aspect of it) has always existed [making it a necessary being], or it has some sort of external cause.

The problem with the first one is apparently obvious. Effects cannot serve as efficient causes. The universe could not have created itself because that entails a logical absurdity- namely, existing before it exists. I think we can safely rule this option out.

The second option- that the universe exists by the necessity of its own nature (that is, it is impossible that the universe not exist)- also seems problematic since necessary being requires never having come into existence, which the universe has. When the universe began to exist at the moment of Big Bang there was no prior space, time, or matter, so whatever it was that caused it to come into being deductively must have been spaceless, timeless, and immaterial. And as the KCA points out, we aren’t really left with too many alternatives here. Spaceless, timeless, immaterial causes really only have to possible options: personal or impersonal causes. So what sort of impersonal, timeless, spaceless, immaterial things exist? Well some philosophers have argued that things like abstract objects fit this criteria, and I’m inclined to agree. Things like numbers, properties, sets, propositions, et cetera all are spaceless, timeless, immaterial and impersonal entities. The problem, however, is that abstract objects are causally impotent! Abstract objects never cause something to begin to exist. William Lane Craig summarizes the problem nicely by asking,

For how else could a timeless cause give rise to a temporal effect like the universe? If the cause were an impersonal set of necessary and sufficient conditions, then the cause could never exist without the effect. If the cause were timelessly present, then the effect would be timelessly present as well. The only way for the cause to be timeless and the effect to begin in time is for the cause to be a personal agent who freely chooses to create an effect in time without any prior determining conditions.”

Which brings us to the third alternative, that the universe was brought into being by some external cause. This alternative seems the most probable given the logical impossibility of the universe having caused itself to exist, the problem of the universe being contingent and therefore not necessary in its existence, and the fact that it is the only option that has the most explanatory power. “Okay, so the universe was caused to exist by some sort of external cause. That doesn’t tell us what the cause is. Why rush off to assuming it’s your religion’s deity?”, right? Well I think we have good reasons for thinking that this cause is a personal creator because of the following reasons:

The cause must be personal. Whatever it was that caused the universe to exist is either timeless, spaceless, immaterial and impersonal, or timelesss, spaceless, immaterial and personal. Given that abstract objects are causally impotent and cannot sufficiently explain what brought the universe into being, it therefore reasonable to deduce that this cause of the universe is a personal cause (i.e. a mind). Taken together, it becomes clear why theists take this as an argument for God’s existence- the cause of the universe is a personal, timeless, spaceless, immaterial mind which is unimaginably powerful (having created a universe ex nihilo).

Thanks again, everyone. I appreciate that arguing with a troll can be satisfying, particularly a troll like Philo, who seems remarkably un-self aware.

I just re-read Philo’s first comment and got all the way to the end this time (without screaming obsenities at my poor, defenseless computer) and I note he said this:

“I have saved the text and taken screenshots to prove later on (should the question arise) that this is the quality of work that gets associated with P.Z. Myers.”

My work is quality enough to get associated with P.Z. Myers?! Whoohoo! Look at me, Maw! Top of the world! I’m smart enough to be associated with P.Z. Myers! And I thought there would be no future in my History degree.

Well, he’s definitely out of my league. I can’t read Craig without doing myself a great injury from excessive eye-rolling.

Philo @238:

“Taken together, it becomes clear why theists take this as an argument for God’s existence- the cause of the universe is a personal, timeless, spaceless, immaterial mind which is unimaginably powerful (having created a universe ex nihilo).”

I just read your response. You wrote a lot and so I hoped somewhere in there I’d find some sort of reference to an argument you found compelling that. Since it wasn’t in that response, will you share with us your reasons why you’re an atheist now? 220+ comments later and now we can finally get some where!

Also, that’s great that you did so well in school. Congrats. Maybe you can put that Aristotelian logic to good use and give us a syllogism?

Philo, that which is asserted without evidence, which your entire post #238, not one citation to any evidence there, can be dismissed without evidence. POOF, your fuckwittery is dismissed for the mental wankery it is. Your deity doesn’t exist, no evidence for it. Your holy book is mythlogy fiction, as you haven’t shown any evidence otherwise. And your theology is nothing but fiction, as it is based on the twin lies of your imaginary deity and your holy book not being mythlogy/fiction.

Show otherwise with solid and conclusive physical evidence, liar and bullshitter.

I see the hypocritical misogynistic lying sack of shit is still hypocritical, still misogynistic, still lying and still a sack of shit. I also note that for someone who seems keen of being polite, he seems unable to offer any kind of apology when one is clear due from him to Sambarge. I guess he is not a polite as he makes out.

I just read your response. You wrote a lot and so I hoped somewhere in there I’d find some sort of reference to an argument you found compelling that. Since it wasn’t in that response, will you share with us your reasons why you’re an atheist now? 220+ comments later and now we can finally get some where!

Also, that’s great that you did so well in school. Congrats. Maybe you can put that Aristotelian logic to good use and give us a syllogism?

Fuck off, you filthy misogynist. The fact that you are so puffed up with false pride as to expect a reply from the woman you excoriated in your first post is all by itself proof of your misogyny, much less all the supporting details you provided later. Your kind is not welcome here.

Go back to your dorm and tell your Catlicker roomies how mean the atheists are over at pharyngula. Go on, we know you want to.

So some of the Catholic priests are pedophiles- what conclusions can you draw from this? That God doesn’t exist? Really?

Yes. The Catholic Church has as doctrine that while God would not actively command the church, he would not let it actively go directly against his wishes or go astray. He would not allow the election of a heretical Pope for example, or allow the Church founders to let in heretical books to the Bible.

either option here means that the Christian God as depicted does not exist.

A) Either “God” exists but is fine with pedophilia, which means that the bible is inaccurate in regards to his character. In other words, a being exists that wants to be called God but is not benevolent and thus other accounts of it are thrown into question.

b) God isn’t present and the Church is acting as people

Either way a pedophilia scandal literally cannot occur in the Catholic Church, all the way up to the level of Pope, and for Jesus The Living Christ god to be real.

So some of the Catholic priests are pedophiles- what conclusions can you draw from this? That God doesn’t exist? Really?

Um, no, fuckface. Priest raping children is entirely independent of proof of the existence of god. Al that sickening story relates is this, the RCC would rather maintain the image of being morally superior that actually admit wrong doing by it’s member and expelling them.

Shit, I was an atheist decades before the stories raping priests and the cover up was expose.

Either “God” exists but is fine with pedophilia, which means that the bible is inaccurate in regards to his character. In other words, a being exists that wants to be called God but is not benevolent and thus other accounts of it are thrown into question.

Come now. You’ve read the Old Testament. If God is a hypocritical, murderous monster, I’d say the OT is pretty accurate in regards to his character.

The altar-boy raping priest was used as an example of dishonesty and hypocrisy, not the lack of the existence of God. I’m sorry I mentioned it because, in combination with my name, I’m afraid it will just re-open old wounds of men who were my friends when they were being assaulted and didn’t know what to do about it.

I don’t need to prove that God doesn’t exist; believers have to prove that he does. And, believers can’t prove that empirically. If they could, they would have by now. Nothing Philo quotes is any different than what I read and rejected as logically false and/or spurious in my late teens/early 20s.

He’s a pathetic intellect who thinks he’s all that and a bag of chips – intellectually.

I like the misogynist pig is being taken apart by one of those intellectually inferior women he so despises. I would say that it must be doing serious damage to his ego, but he is too stupid to realise just how intellectually ahead of him Sambarge is.

The crested porcupine, Hystrix cristata, is the largest of the Old World porcupines with a body length of up to 80 cm and weighing up to 27 kg. It has long quils which can be raised into a crest for defensive purposes. It’s native to northern Africa and the south of Europe, but its range will likely expand to include Philo’s anus, where it may well be introduced in the near future.

I’m getting a healthy giggle out of what a coward this philo kid is. he admits to to being too frightened of women and his obvious inadequacies to respond to what women post. The unconvincing bravado only makes that more clear.

So some of the Catholic priests are pedophiles- what conclusions can you draw from this? That God doesn’t exist? Really?

We can conclude that God does not seem to care about evil committed by those who purport to act in his name. If the victims of such are dissuaded from believing in God, then God’s inaction is not consistent with the claim that God wishes everyone to believe and worship him. (And whether or not it is logical or reasonable for one to disbelieve in God because one has been abused by one of his self-styled servants is completely irrelevant: it is the end result that matters.) All of this supports the claim that if salvation exists, faith is not required. And if faith is not required for salvation, then why exort people to believe in Jesus at all? Annie Dillard’s Eskimo comes to mind. Further, if there is an ‘out’ for individuals abused into atheism, then God must have to adjust for such contingencies in order to be considered just (and no matter what, he is cannot be considered just in any Rawlsian way): but what are these adjustments? No apologist can have any compelling idea at this point: it’s all handwaving, and that’s exactly what WLC does.

Whether believers like it or not, the existence of evil, and evil done in God’s name, tells us something about God, if he exists.

It’s possible, Phido, that you’re too stupid to know you’ve been pwned. But I hope that you do realize you were, at least at some level, and that the fact that it was at the hands of a woman, your intellectual inferior, burns in your gut for weeks like an ulcer.

I didn’t say you needed to prove God doesn’t exist. I’ve never said you have to prove that. I only asked what your reasons for being an atheist are. If you have arguments, great. You said you studied phil of religion and did well, you probably have some insights you can share with us about why you think God doesn’t exist (if you think He doesn’t). So share them with us.

Depending on where you studied phil of religion you probably learned both sides (theological and atheological arguments), so if you think highly of some of the atheological arguments then I just want to know which ones.

Your deity is imginary, only existing between your delusional ears. Prove otherwise with solid and conclusive physcial evidence, or shut the fuck up. Welcome to science where evidence, not OPINION, rules.

Yes, but did you notice his ‘nym? It’s Philo. That’s like, Greek. Did you know Greek and Latin are the languages of intellectuals?

Also Seleucid emperors. And those who would use the nyms of Seleucid emperors as some kind of statement about personal OK. Greeks too.

Philo:

Whatever it was that caused the universe to exist is either timeless, spaceless, immaterial and impersonal, or timelesss, spaceless, immaterial and personal.

So god is nonexistent and impersonal (like the square root of a negative number) or nonexistent and personal (like a smurf). We’ve made some progress today.

Also, if you are interested in understanding the origins of the universe, read physics, not philosophy. A very rudimentary understanding of cosmology would help you see the holes in William Lane Craig’s your argument.

Yes, but did you notice his ‘nym? It’s Philo. That’s like, Greek. Did you know Greek and Latin are the languages of intellectuals?

Also Seleucid emperors. And those who would use the nyms of Seleucid emperors as some kind of statement about personal intellectual faculties. Fuck the Ptolmeys, amirite? OK. Greeks too.

Philo:

Whatever it was that caused the universe to exist is either timeless, spaceless, immaterial and impersonal, or timelesss, spaceless, immaterial and personal.

So god is nonexistent and impersonal (like the square root of a negative number) or nonexistent and personal (like a smurf). We’ve made some progress today.

Also, if you are interested in understanding the origins of the universe, read physics, not philosophy. A very rudimentary understanding of cosmology would help you see the holes in William Lane Craig’s your argument.

I didn’t say you needed to prove God doesn’t exist. I’ve never said you have to prove that. I only asked what your reasons for being an atheist are. If you have arguments, great. You said you studied phil of religion and did well, you probably have some insights you can share with us about why you think God doesn’t exist (if you think He doesn’t). So share them with us.
Depending on where you studied phil of religion you probably learned both sides (theological and atheological arguments), so if you think highly of some of the atheological arguments then I just want to know which ones.

Is it not sufficient for me to reject the existence of what is claimed to be an all-knowing, all-loving, all-powerful being because that being requires,based n sex, my submission to my spouse.

Do I need to a philosopher’s seminal insight before I can reject the existence of a being for which there is no evidence of existence and who requires my submission to my spouse in atonement of a sin I never committed?

Is that what you’re saying? That my reason for not believing in God isn’t good enough because it’s not – what? – a reason given to me by a thoughtful man?

Well, sorry for repeating myself but I am an atheist because I’m a feminist. I don’t know if I would have found reasons to deny the existence of God, if accepting him did not require that I allow myself to be less than the men around me – even the men who are so obviously less than me. I may have rejected God and faith anyway but I may have not. What I know is the first time I rejected God, it was on the basis of my feminism. And that is a completely valid basis for rejection, regardless of what you think, Philo.

The issue of God’s existence has never interested me or affected me except when he is used as a basis for limiting or stripping my rights based on my sex. I’ve never found compelling evidence for the existence of God and, surprisingly, I find the idea of my oppression sufficiently compelling to reject faith and the Abrahamic God.

Let me put this terms you may understand; black people (including men, so this is important, you should pay attention) don’t need a lot of philosophical reasons to reject slavery. Likewise, women don’t need a lot of philosophical reasons to reject misogyny. If you can’t understand that, then we can’t make each other understand anything.

I have read no compelling philosophical arguments for the existence of God. I am, like everyone, unable to reconcile evil in the world (e.g. misogyny) with the existence of an omniscient, omnibenevolent, omnipotent God. That’s it. No reason to believe it, ample reason to reject it.

You still haven’t answered my question, by the way (re. the immaterial mind God and minor submission of women to their spouses).

Do I need to a philosopher’s seminal insight before I can reject the existence of a being for which there is no evidence of existence and who requires my submission to my spouse in atonement of a sin I never committed?

While feminism and humanism plays into my objections to the christian god, those were not the reasons why I became an atheist when I was sixteen or seventeen. I went straight from being a teen lay member of a church to an atheist. It happened because the concept of god made no sense.

I did believe what philo has been trumpeting recently, that god was timeless, eternal and the cause of everything. But I started thinking about what was demanded by this creature, how it handed down laws that were to be followed. Why an eternal and unchanging creature changed it’s mind about Jews being the chosen people and sent Jesus, what of all of the gentiles who lived before Jesus? Why a creature that cannot be hurt by it’s creation cared about what humans did and thought.

I was bothered that this creature, even though there was no need, acted as a tyrant. The rewards for being saved seemed underwhelming.

I could not see the reason why this creature needed to be prayed to. I could not see the need for obedience. I could not see how this creature made any sense. I also looked at my attempt at believing and saw that I did nothing wrong.

So I dropped my concept of god.

I did not become angry at this concept of god until later when I could better see how it twisted the actions of people.

From how I read it, Sambarge, and please correct me if I’m projecting too much; is that it’s an issue of The Catholic God As Presented to Laity(CGPTL) hitting the a problem of evil. The issue is that CGPTL is supposed to be a morally perfect being, yet people’s morality is shaped by secular influences. When one conflicts with the other dissonance is created. Usually this starts with spinning wheels trying to justify or rationalize away a contradiction; but when the evidence from both the scripture itself and the actions of the church (like I said it is Church doctrine that God would not let them lead people astray) you either have to reject your own ethics or reject the idea of God being good. Once the idea of God == benevolence is gone, there is no reason to hold the idea anymore. It isn’t useful, it is no longer a comfortable thought. Once a belief that lacks evidence is no longer comfortable it can be freely eschewed.

Exactly. Even given there was some intelligence behind the creation of the universe, you can strike it out as being any of the god concepts currently espoused by the religious. Almost all of them are in some way personal, and yet there is no evidence for a personal intelligence out there.

So lack of personal intelligence results in… an intelligence that is in no way, shape, or form different from no intelligence at all.

I’d say this one is more like a dead bird carcass. You can’t keep youself from poking it with a stick or nudging it with your foot ’till you see the maggots inside. Fascinating in its own disgusting way, if you can stand the stink.

C’mon, sambarge. I agree with ‘Tis. It’s fun to watch him piss his pants in fear and cower away from even attempting to prove he’s not a weak, terrified boy hiding behind misogyny and fairy tales to convince himself he’s not. I wonder if the flaccid little chickenshit is talking to his imaginary friend about this. I mean, where’s the lightning bolts to shut the bitchez up?

I think we have good reasons to think our reality does contain a God, and not comparably good reasons to think that God does not exist.

You’re still ignoring all that lack of evidence for gods, particularly your favorite pet god. As has been shown, absence of evidence is evidence for absence. Besides, as a philosopher wannabee, you should be aware that the burden of proof in on the person making the positive statement. You’re pretending there’s gods in general and your sadistic bully of a god in particular. So it’s up to you to pony up the evidence to convince us atheists that your megalomaniac of a god exists.

Why does a contingent universe exist? Because the universe is not infinite in duration in its past, what can adequately explain why it exists?

Apparently you’re unfamiliar with the concept of virtual particles. Many cosmologists think, based on evidence, that the net energy of the universe is zero and therefore the entire universe is a virtual particle. Granted, this is only a hypothesis, but then so is the existence of your asshole of a god.

the universe exists by the necessity of its own nature (that is, it is impossible that the universe not exist)- also seems problematic since necessary being requires never having come into existence, which the universe has.

This is just a semantic game. Essentially you’re saying the universe exists and had a beginning but a “necessary being” doesn’t have a beginning so the universe isn’t “necessary”. What is so necessary about a “necessary being”? Just because you and Aquinas really, truly hope that a “necessary being” exists doesn’t mean it does.

Which brings us to the third alternative, that the universe was brought into being by some external cause. This alternative seems the most probable given the logical impossibility of the universe having caused itself to exist, the problem of the universe being contingent and therefore not necessary in its existence, and the fact that it is the only option that has the most explanatory power.

Your bastard god has zero explanatory power. What created it? If you’re pretending it always was then you’re just indulging in special pleading, which is a logical fallacy. Also your motherfucking god violates Occam’s razor. It adds a completely unnecessary part to the origin of the universe, just pushing creation one step further back.

The cause must be personal.

Just because you say so doesn’t make it so.

Given that abstract objects are causally impotent and cannot sufficiently explain what brought the universe into being, it therefore reasonable to deduce that this cause of the universe is a personal cause (i.e. a mind).

Sorry, argument by assertion is unconvincing. As Carl Sagan observed: “Extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence.” It may be reasonable for you to deduce that your asswipe god invented the universe. It’s not reasonable for us.

There’s one further point you’ve been avoiding all this time. You insist your fuckwad Christian god is the one and only deity. Like your hero, Alvin “logical fallacy” Plantinga, you’ve failed to rule out any of the thousands of other gods invented by humans over the millennia. How do you know Huitzilopotchli isn’t getting angrier and angrier that hearts aren’t being offered to him any more and he’ll decide to shut down the universe?

Why does a contingent universe exist? Because the universe is not infinite in duration in its past, what can adequately explain why it exists?

Of course our favorite ghoul thinks that the only way to explain this is philosophical wanking.

It has no choice, since it has no understanding of physics, as this demonstrate :

The problem with the first one is apparently obvious. Effects cannot serve as efficient causes. The universe could not have created itself because that entails a logical absurdity- namely, existing before it exists. I think we can safely rule this option out.

Apparently its brain cannot wrap itself around the concept that space and time are two aspects of the same thing and that demanding causality when both time and space don’t exist is absurd on its face.

My problem with this comment is that it indirectly labels the girls who do get sucked into the church’s misogyny as “not smart”.

True, wanting to stay loyal etc, can be enough to prevent rebellion or questioning.

Ms. Daisy Cutter

Echidna, #205: Thank you for saying this. Because, as it keeps having to be explained to certain, usually male, atheists who don’t understand forces of social pressure — especially those to which they have never been subjected — intelligence is orthogonal to psychological circumstances.
Trust me, Camelspotter, the smarter a girl is, the harder society works to make her hate herself, and oftentimes it succeeds.

Thanks, I’ll try to take that insight on-board.

Philo@238

[David Lane Craig’s Kalam Cosmological Argument]

Simpler explanations for the Big Bang than an all-powerful, God-like mind have not been excluded. Therefore “the universe exists” is not good evidence in favour of such a God.

Craig’s argument is fallacious: “everything that begins to exist has a cause” is not certain because we don’t know why the Big Bang happened. If space-time “began to exist” at the Big Bang we simply don’t know what that implies about any kind of “cause”. Craig’s syllogism cannot help us here. We need to understand the Big Bang better in order to understand the nature of causation better, not the other way around.

Philo’s second favorite philosopher is William Lane Craig. You know, the guy who says that if his god does something obviously immoral, like ordering genocide and rape, then the action becomes completely moral. Craig also says the true victims of the Canaanite genocide were the poor soldiers who had to do the slaughtering. And the genocide was the Canaanites’ fault anyway, because they didn’t move off their land just because some foreign invaders wanted it.

There is no reason or need to believe it ain’t just chemistry and physics; to say it a different way, there is no evidence for the entity people call god(s) but there is evidence – be it empirical or mathematical – for chemistry and physics at work.

Okay, around post 181 I just skipped right to the bottom here as it seems like Philo (how dare you use that noble man’s name!) has shut down his higher functions and begun channeling van Til and company.

Philo, there is a fallacy you and all others of your ilk commit, which underlies all your theological arguments: you equate Yahweh with the philosophers’ God. Get this through your thick Calvinist skull right the fuck now: they are not the same.

There very well may be a God. There may very well be a necessary being. There may very well be a self-caused, eternal, transcendent, omni-$ATTRIBUTE existence. We can’t prove there isn’t, not with these puny finite minds, especially not if this God feels like hiding from us.

There may well be a God…but it is not your scatological, murderous, petty, tortuous sky tyrant who couldn’t figure out that, e.g., a spine is a pretty poor vertical support. You are the worst class of blasphemer, because instead of making use of the evidence whatever God that may exist has planted around you in the natural world, you twist and bend the world around your own evil thoughts.

Luther was right; Reason is a whore. But in an enlightened society, we punish the pimps and johns, and you, my fundamentalist friend, are both. Your God, in actuality, lives between your ears. You and yours spew bad science and worse philosophy, and in your chest beats the heart of a vulture, with the conscience of a hyena in your mind. For the love of all that is good, disappear and never inflict yourself on the internet again.

Hmm… It would have been nicer played if I had remembered to type “have” in the original.

Tpyos haeppn.

Camelspotter:

Thanks, I’ll try to take that insight on-board.

Thanks.

Timaahy:

The Christian god’s a fucking Toyota Corolla.

HEY! As a Corolla owner, I object. A Toyota Corolla is a reliable, well-made, unflashy automobile that will last a long time with basic maintenance. It’s much better than any deity but especially the xtian one.

Is philo gone yet? I find it extraordinary that all it take is for a woman to say, “I am a feminist and it informs my decisions” to have some random guy pop up and tell her that her reason isn’t good enough. That is male privilege in a nutshell.

Actually, all gods are Corollas. They’re boring, they all look the same, but they’re so goddamn reliable (although, “persistent” might be more appropriate) that we’ll never fucking get rid of them.

I’m still trying to amend my theory to allow for the fact that they’re made in Japan and don’t oppress women in any obvious way. But I’ll get there. Probably by defining these ex velour cathedra to be necessarily sufficient properties of god-car analogies in all possible worlds.

Philo made the same mistake his ilk always make – that demonstrating, through seemingly reasonable logic, that a god could exist means he can also claim that his specific god does exist – a move that, when you look at it, is just a fundamentally dishonest bait & switch.